Some UC employees will soon need to choose a new health insurance policy from a new pool of options offered by the University of California.
The University of California announced it will eliminate four of its seven current plans and introduce two new plans in their place. There are now only five plans offered for 2014, which employees can enroll in on Oct. 28.
The change comes in response to the projected rising cost of the four discontinued plans, said Mark Peterson, a UCLA professor and member of the UC Academic Senate Committee on Faculty Welfare Health Care Task Force. The committee deals with issues regarding health care benefits for UC employees.
After this summer, it became clear that there needed to be a change in the medical plans that were being offered, Peterson said.
Peterson said health care costs have been on the rise and the companies that the UC was using for their employees’ health care plans – such as Anthem and Health Net – were not able to keep costs down. As a result, the University is discontinuing their contracts with the companies.
In their place, Blue Shield, a California health care company, will help provide the two new plans.
The UC projected that it would become increasingly too expensive to stay with the other companies, said UC spokeswoman Shelly Meron.
The UC evaluates these changes in costs and responds to it every year, Meron said. It then receives proposals from health care companies each year and determines which plans are of high value and low cost, Peterson said.
One of the new plans, UC Care, will cover costs for employees at all of the UC’s medical centers, some providers near UC medical centers and 65,000 other providers under the Blue Shield network. Blue Shield also offers the second new plan.
“Health care in the U.S. is the most expensive in the world,” Peterson said. “Everyone has to wrestle with that.”
Throughout the process, however, Peterson said many employees who participated in the process were skeptical of the plan changes.
Victor Narro, project director of the UCLA Labor Center, said his current plan is being discontinued and he is looking to see which plan will allow him to keep his current doctor.
Narro said he is also concerned about how much he will be asked to pay out-of-pocket for doctor visits for each plan.
The UC said it will release more information about the rates next week, including monthly costs and copay information.
Narro added that he hopes the UC will soon do a good job educating employees about the new changes and reduce confusion.
“I think people will be swamped with information,” Narro said. “The UC needs to have a mechanism for its outreach.”