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[Official Guidance]
COBRA Subsidy Recipients Who Later Become Eligible for Insurance Coverage Should Notify Their Former Employer to Avoid a Penalty
Excerpt: "Individuals who have qualified and received the 65 percent subsidy for COBRA health insurance, due to involuntary termination from a prior job, should notify their former employer if they become eligible for other group health coverage. . . . in writing that they are no longer eligible for the COBRA subsidy. . . . If an individual continues to receive the subsidy after they are eligible for other group health coverage, such as coverage from a new job or Medicare eligibility, the individual may be subject to the new IRC § 6720C penalty of 110 percent of the subsidy provided after they became eligible for the new coverage." (Internal Revenue Service)


[Guidance Overview]
Court Declares Gastric Bypass to Ensure Success of Second Surgery Compensable
Excerpt: "An insurer must pay for the gastric bypass surgery doctors said a worker needed for a knee surgery to succeed, Oregon's Supreme Court ruled Thursday. The ruling in SAIF Corp. vs. Edward G. Sprague upholds an appeals court finding favoring the claimant, who weighed 350 pounds in 2000 when he underwent the gastric bypass surgery to treat his 'severe morbid obesity,' court records state. Mr. Sprague had suffered a work-related left knee injury in 1976, and nearly 25 years later the knee had deteriorated when he hurt it again while working. Doctors concluded his obesity needed treatment in order for knee surgery to succeed." (Business Insurance)


[Guidance Overview]
Motorola Benefits Ruling Clarifies Conflicted Administrator Law
Excerpt: "Federal court judges continued refining their approach to handling benefits award cases involving a conflict of interest by a plan administrator, with an appellate court ruling in favor of a Motorola employee. Upholding a decision by U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan E. Cox of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the key issue in benefits award disputes, such as the one involving plaintiff Michael Marrs, was the likelihood the plan administrator's conflict shaped the ultimate resolution. The Marrs suit against the Motorola's Disability Income Plan concerned a cutoff of benefits for treatment of a psychiatric condition after the plan put amended documents in place containing a time limit for such treatments." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)


[Guidance Overview]
Final FTC Rule on Health Information Breach Notification
Excerpt: "EBIA Comment: The HHS final interim rule on breach notification for unsecured PHI has also been published and is effective September 23, 2009. Together, the adoption of the FTC and HHS final rules creates far-reaching breach notification requirements under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA)." (Employee Benefits Institute of America)


[Guidance Overview]
IRS Reminder That COBRA Subsidy Recipients Must Notify Plan of Other Coverage or Face Penalty
Excerpt: "EBIA Comment: The DOL notice that group health plans were required to send to individuals advising them of their right to subsidized COBRA premium payments includes the form individuals should use to notify the plan that they are eligible for other group health plan coverage or Medicare . . . ." (Employee Benefits Institute of America)


Health Care Reform and Account-Based Health Plans: What Does the Future Hold for Employers? (PDF)
3 pages. Excerpt: "As the health care reform debate continues into the fall of 2009, employers that offer or are considering consumer-driven, account-based health plans (ABHPs) may wonder how those plans will fare after reform is fully implemented." (Towers Perrin)


Health Care Overhaul's Quandary: Costs vs. Fairness
Excerpt: "Insurers want Congress to let them charge older Americans five times more than young ones. The industry trade group America's Health Insurance Plans said in a July letter to House leaders that anything less than that would force many young people to pay more to 'heavily subsidize the naturally higher health care costs of older individuals.' [It stated further that] '[t]he policy question that needs to be answered is, how much do you want young people to absorb?' says Karen Ignagni, the group's CEO." (USA Today)


Rising Healthcare Costs Hurting Industries with Most Employer-Sponsored Insurance
Excerpt: "Rapidly rising healthcare costs, which are taking up greater portions of the gross domestic product (GDP), are having an adverse effect on many major industries -- especially those that have higher percentages of workers with employer-sponsored insurance, according to a new study from Rand. For example, between 1987 to 2005, when healthcare costs rose rapidly from 10.8% to 15.2% of the GDP, the workforces in industries with larger percentages of workers with employer-sponsored insurance grew more slowly, said Neeraj Sood, a RAND senior economist, and one of the study authors, in a presentation on Capitol Hill. The study looked at 38 different industries." (HealthLeaders Media)


Several News Organizations Publish Explainers and Fact Checkers on Health Reform Bills
Excerpt: "The Los Angeles Times provides a Q&A that dissects the costs and various proposals of the pending Democratic healthcare bills. 'The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects that after revenue-generating provisions and savings in Medicare and Medicaid, the House bill would add $239 billion to the deficit over 10 years.' The Times also examines which plans qualify as so-called Cadillac plans and how the government might 'squeeze savings out of Medicare without cutting patient services' (Geiger and Oliphant, 8/31). The Herald-Sun (Durham, N.C.) has 'a look at the differentiating factors between the main bill, the House Tri-Committee bill commonly known as H.B. 3200, and various proposals and other bills on the table' (8/29)." (Kaiser Family Foundation)


Burger Chain's Health-Care Recipe: Pay More of Insurance Cost and Cut Turnover, Boosts Sale and Productivity
Excerpt: "Four years ago, executives of Burgerville, a regional restaurant chain, agreed to pay at least 90% of health-care premiums for hourly employees who work at least 20 hours a week. Today, the executives say the unusual move has saved money by cutting turnover, boosting sales and improving productivity. Burgerville's experience is notable for the food-service industry, where turnover is high and fewer than half of chains offer health insurance for part-time hourly employees, according to People Report, a research firm. The chains that do offer benefits pay on average 49% of the cost for employees working at least 30 hours a week, People Report says." (The Wall Street Journal)


EEOC Claims UPS Medical Leave Policy is Discriminatory
Excerpt: "In a class action lawsuit filed in federal court in Chicago, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charged that Atlanta-based United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS) violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by rejecting an extension of medical leave as a reasonable accommodation for its employees with disabilities. The suit is being filed on behalf of a class of employees who were fired after exceeding UPS' 12-month leave policy. '[P]olicies like this one at UPS, which set arbitrary deadlines for returning to work after medical treatment, unfairly keep disabled employees from working,' said EEOC Chicago Regional Attorney John Hendrickson, in a press release." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)

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Links to Items on Executive Comp, Benefits in General

Court Says Furlough Violated Employees' Rights
Excerpt: "The U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland has determined that a furlough plan instituted by Prince George's County in Maryland violated employees' rights under the U.S. Constitution's Contract Clause. Several unions, in their complaint, contended that the provisions of the collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) that set the wages and hours for employees preempt any contrary provision from being enacted and made the furlough plan inactive. The court agreed with the unions that the CBAs give employees a solid expectation of the money they will earn for the year, and the employee relies on this. The court also pointed out that the county had other options for correcting its budget problems, such as tapping approximately $97 million in unrestricted reserve funds. 'Although the county suggests to the court that it faced dire circumstances and had no other reasonable alternatives, the record suggests otherwise and the county's own actions resemble trappings of doing that which was 'politically expedient,'' the opinion said." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)

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Webcasts and Conferences

EFAST2: The Future of Form 5500 Workshop - October - December, in 23 Cities
Nationwide on October 1, 2009
presented by SunGard Relius

ERISA Workshop - in 21 Cities, October - December, 2009
Nationwide on October 2, 2009
presented by SunGard Relius

Plan Forms, Notices, and Amendments: Streamlined, Effectively, Timely Workshop in 23 Cities, October - December 2009
Nationwide on October 1, 2009
presented by SunGard Relius

Regulatory and Legislative Changes
in California on September 17, 2009
presented by Western Pension & Benefits Conference - Orange County Chapter

Webinar: Increasing Employee Productivity With Online Benefits Enrollment
Nationwide on September 3, 2009
presented by Benefit Software Inc.

Webinar: Improving Employee Morale with Total Rewards Statements
Nationwide on September 3, 2009
presented by Benefit Software Inc.

( Click to post your webcast or conference )

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Press Releases

U.S. Labor Department Obtains Default Judgment and Court Appointment of Independent Fiduciary for 401(k) Plan Abandoned by Kennebunk, Maine, Company
U.S. Department of Labor, Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA)

PAi Announces Results of Customer Satisfaction Survey
PAi

MassMutual Analysis: Whole Life Insurance Can Help Supply Retirement Income, Preserve Equity Portfolios During Bear Markets
MassMutual

Veteran Nonqualified Plan Expert Joins CAPTRUST Financial Advisors
CAPTRUST Financial Advisors

( Click to post your press release )

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Employee Benefits Jobs

Corporate Benefits Administrator (Retirement)
for Dairy Farmers of America
in MO

( Click to post your job opening | View all jobs | RSS feed of all jobs )

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EmployeeBenefitsJobs.com (Sponsor)

(Click on banner to learn more.)

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Handy Links:

• View Today's Active Message Threads
• Using the Web for Employee Benefits Research (hypertext article)
• Employee Benefits Library

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