SUPPLEMENTAL (VOLUNTARY) INSURANCE

More and more studies show that health care costs continue to rise in this country. Many employers are reacting by revising their insurance and benefit offerings to reflect this trend and compensate for increased costs. What do these changes mean for you?

• 56 percent of employers report that employee contributions will increase with the trend or greater than the trend rate – meaning some employees will take on a greater proportion of health care costs than they currently pay.
• Nearly three-quarters of employers consider benefit reductions or an increase in co-payments “likely” or “somewhat likely” in the coming twelve months.

How will these possible benefit reductions and increased benefit costs affect your insurance coverage? What about next year? What changes will it bring? Although we can’t predict the future, we can help you prepare for what happens next.

Traditional medical insurance doesn’t cover every expense related to an illness, injury, or death. The bills and expenses continue to add up, especially if you have to stop working and lose your income. How will you pay the deductibles or co-payments, and other increasing medical costs not covered by your employer-sponsored insurance plan?

Supplemental insurance can help you prepare for these and other out-of-pocket expenses. Most of all, these plans help take the worry away about how you will pay your out-of-pocket medical and other everyday life bills. Without this worry, you can focus on getting better.

Supplemental Benefits creates a win-win situation for both employers and employees. It gives employers a cost-free way to expand their benefits program while giving employees the flexibility they want in their benefit package. Also referred to as Voluntary Benefits, supplemental means the insurance is offered in addition to an employer’s core or standard benefits. With the health insurance that employees already have there are almost always out-of-pocket expenses, such as co-pays, deductibles, lost wages, etc., which are not covered. Supplemental Insurance helps cover these expenses.

Employers can offer core benefits plus a menu of supplemental products to give their employees an enhanced benefits program. The employee can then create a benefit package that helps meet their specific needs. They pay for the supplemental benefits they choose and the premium is deducted from their paycheck.

Supplemental insurance products help protect you in the following ways:

• Disability insurance can help protect your most valuable asset – your income. This insurance provides benefits to help offset the financial losses that may result when you are disabled due to a covered injury or illness.
• Supplemental life insurance is a valuable complement to employer-provided life insurance.
• A serious accident, illness, or hospital stay can result in significant out-of-pocket expenses that aren’t covered by traditional medical insurance. Accident, cancer, critical illness, and hospital confinement indemnity insurance can help protect against such expenses.

Supplemental insurance is offered at the worksite (through the employer) and features convenient payroll deduction for premium payments. Plus, many plans can be purchased through a flexible benefits plan allowing you to pay for the coverage with pretax dollars. Supplemental Insurance is fully portable so the employee can keep his or her coverage with no increase in premium if they leave the company.

Voluntary benefits are one of the most popular types of employee benefits being offered today. Because the employees are qualifying through their employer, they enjoy simplified underwriting and attractive prices. And they can take the insurance with them, at the same group rates, if they leave the company.

The plans are flexible so that supplemental coverage can be tailored to help meet individual needs. The supplemental insurance plans offered are:

• Disability Insurance
• Life Insurance
• Accident Insurance
• Hospital Confinement Indemnity Insurance
• Cancer and Critical Illness Insurance