Walmart's health care plan for new hires
Moms View Message Board: The Kitchen Table (Debating Board): Walmart's health care plan for new hires
Walmart is offering a new health care plan for its new hires:
The option known as the "value plan" starts at $11 per month for employee coverage in some markets and has a $1,000 deductible. The "freedom plan" starts at about $17 per month for employee coverage but has a deductible of $3,000 and the option to create a health savings account. The cheapest monthly cost for an employee and his or her spouse is $38 with a deductible of $6,000.
And, they will increase the surcharge for spouses who have access to health care insurance at their own jobs from $50 every two weeks to $75 every two weeks if the Walmart employee chooses to cover his/her spouse through the Walmart plan.
Most existing employees had opted for a plan that costs between $70 and $100 a month with a $350 deductible.
I can't imagine a plan with a $6,000 deductible (or a $3,000 deductible), even with a "health savings plan" (which means that you authorize Walmart to deduct money from your pay for the health savings plan, and the only advantage is that it is pre-tax dollars).
I don't know what the current rules are, but as of last year, one had to be employed full-time at Walmart for 6 months before being eligible for health care insurance, and part-timers had to be there 2 years.
In Alabama, 4,700 children of Walmart employees were on Medicaid in 2005. In Georgia, 10,000 children of Walmart employees were on Medicaid in 2004. A California study in 2004 said that uninsured Walmart employees were costing California $32 Million a year for health care. In Pennsylvania, in late 2005, 1 out of 6 Walmart employees was on Medicaid (more than 7,500). In 2004, about 25% of Walmart's 37,000 workers in Tennessee were in Medicaid. In 2005, in Arkansas, 3,900 Walmart employees were receiving state assistance, mostly Medicaid. In Arizona, in 2005, 2,700 Walmart workers (about 9% of their workforce) were on Medicaid.
An internal memo sent to Wal-Mart's board of directors proposes numerous ways to hold down spending on health care and other benefits while seeking to minimize damage to the retailer's reputation. In that memo. M. Susan Chambers, Wal-Mart's executive vice president for benefits, acknowledged that 46 percent of the children of Wal-Mart's 1.33 million United States employees were uninsured or on Medicaid.
Personally, I think $70 to $100 a month for health coverage for a family is pretty cheap! Especially with that low of a deductable. Right now, we pay $540 a month for health and dental and that is with a $1500 deductable, per family member! I guess I am really not debating.
I agree, the $70-100 plan with a $350 deductible is pretty cheap. The plan for new hires is, however, a very different story.
I would be very unhappy with a $1500 deductible per family member myself.
There's no two ways about it - the cost of health care insurance, for employers and for individuals, is more and more of a problem. I am very fortunate in that my employers pay the full cost of HMO coverage (with a very good Blue Cross plan) for the employee, the co-pays are quite reasonable, and the prescription program is pretty good. The dental isn't so great (partly because my dentist isn't in the system), but it beats not having any dental insurance, and I don't know of many very great dental programs.
More and more employers are finding the costs of health insurance for their employees is more than they can afford. And, truthfully, Walmart is not a whole lot worse than many other employers in their kind of business. They are, however, pretty much the worst - and they are so darned big that they tend to be a model for other retail chains.
Welcome to teacher insurance! 
Deductibles are $1500 per person per year in school districts all over our county. The premiums are $185 PER PERSON PER PAY 92 pays/mth). Many teachers work second jobs to fund their healthcare, especially those who are also married to other teachers. I thought you were supposed to GAIN something by being an educated professional. Guess not.
I'm fortunate I never had to use it. We pay $135/month for our family and we could add up to 4 more kids with that premium. We have NO deductible and pay $15 for office calls, $5 for scripts. We feel very blessed to have our insurance.
The last plan my employer offered before he took that benefit away from me was an HSA type plan. I hated it.
I am currently on DH's group plan at a cost of $530 a month, with a $400 or $500 annual deductible per person and various copays. Some of our Rx copays are $50 for certain meds. Our copays for our Rx's are between $300 & $400 monthly. We NEED decent health insurance because we use the heck out of it.
I'd be thrilled to pay $100 or $200 a month with a $350 deductible.
Even WITH insurance, I have a few thousand in out of pocket that I owe for the ER thing in June, and now this hand thing. Even WITH *supposedly* good insurance (Blue Cross), we are spending a fortune.
Where I work the employee is free, to cover kids is $250/month to cover spouse is $350/month and to cover spouse and kids is $750/month. It's a PPO and deductible is $1000. Office visits $25 and drugs 15/35/50.
You also have the option of HSA where the premiums are lower (maybe by half) as above and deductible is $3000 for employee only and $6000 when you have dependent coverage. The company also throws $1200 in your HSA account to get you started.
The Wal-Mart plan with the $350 deductible sounds way cheap. The full time 6 month requirement is a hitch though. Aren't most Wal-Mart employees part-time and isn't there high turnover? Can't management avoid scheduling people for full time to keep them from being eligible? I'm just wondering how Wal-Mart can offer such a cheap plan.
I am thankful that I live in Canada! I know our taxes are higher, but I don't pay for anything other than a fraction of our prescriptions and dental. I can't imagine having to come up with the amounts you are all quoting!
Our current insurance is 250 deductible per person with the plan paying 80% and we pay 20%. Our out of pocket limit is $900 per person per year. Not too bad, but starting next year it will be a 450 deductible per person, 2000 out of pocket limit per person with the 80/20 plan. For us it is not very affordable. For an ER visit for my dh a few months ago we owe $1000. Not something we can afford. For the birth of the next baby I will be paying almost $1000. I mean it is difficult for us and have opted to put the kids on soonercare since we qualify and keep the insurance on ourselves for emergencies. Oh and co pays are 25.00. I had much better coverage in Ohio working for a hospital. It was at least 90/10.
I agree with Mommmie...I don't think the Walmart plan is bad at all. When I worked for Meijer for a year while I was in college, the insurance was terrific. MUCH better than the teacher insurance I could have had. You paid nothing at all for the employee, and the family rate was like $150/month. I'm not sure what the deductibles were though, because I didn't have it since I was still on my parents' insurance at the time.
Sorry about my typo in the previous post...I meant to write that we have 2 pays /month, NOT 92!
My dh has been in grocery since we've been married and I have to say that this is one area where the grocery business has been amazing. He's worked in two union jobs and two non-union (one employee-owned company) and right now we pay $47/pay period (two per month) for our family of five. Our deductible is $100/year/person and we pay 15% on prescriptions. My mother is a teacher and she pays $300/month for just herself and has a $1000 deductible. I don't have a clue what she pays for Rxs but I know she's said time and again that it's too much. My dh's company figured out what their employees would be paid if the company didn't pay for our insurance and it dropped their management's pay to under minimum wage.
Without comparing it to our insurance payments, I think that Walmart's plan doesn't seem bad. The only consideration to take into account is what the employees' wages are in the first place. If they aren't making much more than minimum wage, coming up with a $1, 3 or 6K deductible would be impossible.
For our health insurance:
Active Medical $176.77
Active Dental $19.38
Active Vision $4.15
Life Insurance $5.68
AD&D $0.68
Spouse Life $1.04
Tobacco Credit Pyrl Deduction $23.08
There would be a surcharge for me, if I wanted this medical insurance and I had medical insurance offered where I work. I don't get the medical insurance, where I work, since I'm casual. We also get a credit, since we don't smoke.
We have a $20 co-pay to see our primary doctor
$40 co-pay if we go to a specialist
$150 co-pay if we go to the ER
$250 co-pay for hospital visit and then 10%(insurance covers 90%, after 250)
Out of pocket max, is $4000 for a family. Deductible $600 for family.
I see it covers one physical a year or one well-woman exam per year, with co-pay and 100% on mammograms. Guess I should get that appointment made, huh? It's been a couple of years, since my last pap.
Thankfully our whole family has insurance now. We pay $131 a month & we have a $100 detuctible per person/$300 max for the family. We pay 15% after the deductible has been met. We pay $10 for name brand meds & $5 for generic. They pay up to $100 for yearly physicals for every family member. We are truly lucky, when we didn't have insurance it was scary.
I am not sure how good the dental is, that starts in November.
I would like to see an affordable health care plan for everyone, but I don't think that will ever happen.
I find it interesting that Wal Mart gets more criticism for its compensation of employees than it does kudos for providing a low cost alternative for low-income consumers in the way of low prices as well as the new plan to provide certain generic drugs for $4.
Anyway, I do have my qualms with Wal Mart, but they have nothing to do with the way it compensates its employees. I have a friend who is a cashier and makes $12/hour, which is great for a cashier in this area. (I don't know what she pays for insurance.)
I don't understand why the plans with the higher deductible don't have a lower monthly employee payment.
And I would only go with a Health Savings Plan if the amount of money in the plan can be rolled over into the next year. My dh's company offers one, but that is the only thing preventing us from enrolling in it- if the employee does't use up all the money in the "savings account" by the end of the year they lose it and have to start all over the following year from $0.
But perhaps the better way to attack the rising cost of health insurance is to go to the root of the problem- the rising cost of healthcare itself. I mean, (not talking Walmart specifically) how much longer are we to expect employers to continue to foot the insurance bill past the point where the cost of providing insurance no longer allows the company to be profitable?
And with regard to Walmart, once they are required to provide all these benefits, which is what democratic lawmakers all over the country are hoping to do, the cost will most assuredly be passed down to the consumer through price increases.
I am not seeing this debate. Walmart is free to offer or not offer any benefits it chooses. If you do not agree with their policies don't shop there. We decided several years ago to not shop there or at the big Home Depot, Lowe's etc. unless we had no other choice, because I saw how it affected small business in my area.
Colette, I understand what you mean, but the fact is that many lawmakers are in fact trying to get laws passed that require Walmart to pay more for employee benefits and pay. Maryland's General Assembly passed a law called the Fair Share Health Care Fund Act that will require Wal-Mart, as an employer with more than 10,000 employees, to dedicate 8 percent of its payroll costs to employee health care. And in Chicago, the mayor vetoed a city ordinance that would have required all big box stores to pay their employees no less than $10 per hour within 4 years.
So Walmart will not be as free to offer or not offer any benefits it chooses much longer, and the cost of those expenses that lawmakers will require will be passed down to the consumer in the way of higher prices.
Thanks Lisa, I did not know aobut the Fair Share Health Care Fund.
Deanna, that is funny. Here in NY Teachers have the best insurance. Their out of pocket is minimal and the coverage is excellent.
Health insurance is a sore subject with me. When I was employed as a teacher it was a freebie for my family. The drug coverage was excellent! Now we pay 12,000 a year for family medical insurance and drug coverage. Our copays for drugs are high. We do not have dental. Most places are hiring people the max number of hours they can without having to offer coverage because costs are so high. At least Walmart is still offering something.
Ame
Ditto Marcia-The taxes are higher but having OHIP is wonderful.I couldn't imagine having to pay what you guys pay out.With my DH coverage from work we just pay 20% of prescription/dental costs.
Lisa, what your employer (or your husband's employer) probably has now is a Section 125 cafeteria plan, as does my employer. You can put pre-tax dollars into it and use it for health care expenses (co-pays, deductibles, dental, eye care, prescriptions) and, if the employer sets it up that way, child-care. The no roll-over rule is an IRS rule, not the employer's rule. Last year the IRS eased up, and said any money that was unused could be rolled over IF it was used in the first 2-1/2 months of the following year. The company that manages my firm's plan is very, very strict, requiring bills/receipts from child-care providers, and I am frequently having to provide a copy of a doctor's bill or itemized prescription receipt (which is OK - that's the rule).
A Health Savings Account such as the President talks about, and which are currently available, is a different thing entirely. All the money you put into it can be rolled over into subsequent years if not spent. The maximum that can be contributed in any year is $2,700 for an individual and $5,450 for a family in 2006 - BUT - it must be coupled with a high-deductible health insurance plan that meets the HSA requirements, and you can't have other insurance. So if you are on Medicare, unless you select an HSA type Medicare plan, you can't have a Health Savings Account. If your employer offers health insurance but does not offer an HSA plan (hopefully with an accompanying savings account provision), you can't have an HSA. And, an insurance company can sell you an HSA qualified, high deductible plan but is not required to simultaneously tell you how to go about seeing up a Health Savings Account so you can save to pay the high deductibles.
Prepaid health care (health insurance) is a relatively recent development, as history goes. The first plan in the U.S. was in 1929, in Baylor, Texas. Blue Cross was actually started by the American Hospital Association, partly to reduce price competition between hospitals, and Blue Shield (to pay doctor bills) was started in 1934. Employer paid health insurance began in WWII, when employers were limited in the wage increases they could offer to attract employees (there was a shortage, with so many men in the military and fighting), but could offer employer paid benefits. It wasn't until 1954 that the cost of a health insurance benefit was made a non-taxable benefit for the employee (i.e., not subject to income tax). So employer paid health insurance is only a little over 60 years old. When a large portion of U.S. jobs were in manufacturing and industry, which meant concentrated large labor forces, union membership was high and unions made free or almost free health insurance a consistent demand for union contracts. As the job picture has changed and large-scale manufacturing is mostly "off shore", and unions have lost force, that picture has changed. Still, most state and muncipal employees have free or nearly free health insurance (and are usually members of a union, like AFSCME, FOP).
Yes, I suppose Walmart, and any other employer, can offer (or not offer) health insurance as they choose. But the flip side of that coin is that if employers don't offer health insurance that is affordable to their employees, the employees will still seek health care, at least in emergencies. And if it isn't paid for by an employment related plan, it is paid for out of tax dollars. So while you may save on jeans and jammies at Walmart, the cost of that health care is still coming out of your pocket - either directly in higher taxes, or indirectly in reduced government services.
Ginny, it is open enrollment time at my husband's work, and we received some information in a small brochure. They call them Flexible Spending Accounts and as you mentioned, they can be used for childcare as well as tuition for pre-school, and they can also be used to to provide for some expenses of caring for an elderly family member.
They also have the Healthcare Flexible Spending Account to save for deductibles and copays or any other non-covered expense for medical, dental, or vision as well as over-the-counter medications used for medical care (aspirin.) This FSA is accompanied by a debit card.
The information we received did not go into much more detail, so it doesn't say if any balance in the account will roll over into the following year or if we lose it all at the end of the year. We still will probably not participate in this program because at this time, we don't have a need.
Usually you are not able to carry the balance, but the rules have a little bit of lee-way so that if the plan goes from Jan-Dec you actually have til March to use it all before you lose it.
We had a Benny card - which looked like a mastercard/visa and was to be used as such, for purchases of anything medical/health related - from co-payments to contact lense solution, it all fell under the flex spending account.
Dh has a new job and we are enrolling in their flexspending account. Basically works like this - if he made $100 and elected to have $25 taken out of every paycheck - that $25 is taken out Pretax so his paycheck would only be taxed on $75 instead of $100.
The trick is figuring out how much $$ roughly you will be spending on medical expenses for the year. We are using it because ds will be getting braces.
The benny card thing, was kind of hard, because we didn't have any major medical expenses, so I had a hard time figuring out how much we should put in. With the new plan, I just asked the orthodontist what the bottom line will be and told him to bill me after 1/1/07.
duh - nevermind, I didn't scroll up and see that Ginny explained the whole thing. sorry!
That's okay- thanks for your input!
Colette is right, Lisa. The trick is to figure out what you will probably spend, taking into account all your qualified medical expenses (dentist, prescription co-pays, doctor visit co-pays, eyeglasses/contacts, and some very limited over the counter medicines IF your doctor tells you to take it - and, if your plan allows it, child-care expenses, but check the details of what they allow very very carefully). I planned to buy glasses last year, and tried to take everything into account - and lo and behold my employer changed health care plans, my co-pays went up, and I ran out of "flexible plan" money before the end of the year. This year my employer changed health plans again and co-pays went down, but I also was putting a bit less into the "flexible" plan, so that's alright.
The thing to keep in mind is that if you don't use it by the middle or end of March of the next year, it is gone, gone, gone. That's an IRS rule, not your employer's rule or the "flexible" plan's rule. So while it is nice to have some pre-tax dollars to pay for things (you pay less income tax overall that way), it is better to put a little less than you think you'll need into the plan, so that you don't wind up losing that money.
Our plan manager just sent us all a letter telling us the IRS is really cracking down on flexible spending plans, so the plan management company will be requiring more receipts and the receipts must be provided within 30 days of the notice or the expenditure will be disallowed. I can't imagine how people would be able to cheat on something like this, but I guess I just don't think along those lines.
And remember, if you do run out of "flexible" plan money before the end of the year, you can still get the medical care, prescriptions, etc. - you are just paying for them with after-tax dollars instead of pre-tax dollars (which was what we all did before the flex plans came into being). How much difference that makes depends on what percentage of your salary actually goes to income tax.
By the way, any employer that offers a flexible savings plan (the Section 125 Cafeteria plan) is actually pretty generous. They have to pay an authorized, IRS approved management company to manage it, and the management fees come out of the employer's pocket, not the employee's. Sometimes a benefits management company will cut the employer a deal if they get all of the company's benefit business, but it is still the employer paying for the plan management.
I honestly can't imagine having to pay anything out of our paycheck for health insurance. That would be one touch check to write each month. Or, one tough deduction to see on the paystub.
We are very fortunate with DH's work. It covers the entire immediate family for FREE. We pay nothing at all. We feel so blessed to have this, and I always wonder in the back of my mind how long it can possibly last.
It seems that healthcare costs are rising, because they know that insurance or welfare is paying for it. If NO one had insurance or welfare, there would be a huge drop in medical costs.
I think it's terrible that people who are sick or injured, especially children and the elderly, can't get medical attention because they can't afford it.
It really grates on my nerves that we focus so much on foreign countries, and don't pay attention to what's going on in our own back yard. What about OUR children, what about OUR citizens?
Breann, you are very lucky. Most companies make you pay something! We had "cadillac" health insurance, when we first got married, from the hospital, where I worked. They paid 75% of the premium and we had to pay 25%. They covered pretty much everything. It probably isn't that way anymore, though.
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