Your Turn Rostered Leaders (and others)

From now until November 22, if you are a sponsored employee in the ELCA health benefit plan through Portico Benefits, you have important decisions to make about your benefits for 2014.

Go to www.porticobenefits.org.

Under the “Our Websites” tab, click on MyPortico.

1. You will be asked to make a decision about your health benefit plan for 2014.      You may:

• accept the plan offered by your employer,
• buy up to a more expensive plan, or
• waive coverage altogether.

2. You will be asked about tax-advantaged contributions to:

• a Health Care Flexible Spending Account (FSA)
• an Dependent (Day) Care Flexible Spending Account (FSA)

3. You will be offered the chance to purchase supplemental and dependent group life insurance. Hopefully you reviewed the recent mailing from Portico Benefits on the option to purchase additional life insurance at a very competitive rate without any visits to a doctor first. This is a one-time option you will want to take a close look at. If you choose to do this, you will need the social security number and birthday of any primary and secondary beneficiary.

4. You will be asked if you wish to make pre-tax retirement account contributions.

As you move through the process, a chart on the right keeps a running account of your choices and the cost to you, if any.

So, if you haven’t done so, surf on over to www.porticobenefits.org and make those choices before November 22.

 

Two Weeks to Go

So where are we now with making those 2014 Health Care choices? Only about 35 congregations in the I-K Synod have gone in and offered a plan.

• October 14 is the deadline for congregations to register the plan they are offering at EmployerLink.
• November 1-22 is the time frame for rostered leaders to accept the plan that is offered, buy up, or waive coverage.

Which employers need to make a health benefit option election for 2014?

• Employers currently sponsoring any members (even if all those members are waived or Medicare-primary).
• Employers who have sponsored at least one member since January 01, 2012, even if they are not currently sponsoring any members.
• Employers not currently sponsoring but planning on sponsoring in 2014.

Employers who do not need to make a health benefit election for 2014:

• Employers who have not sponsored any members since before January 01, 2012, and who do not intend to sponsor any members in 2014.
• Special exception employers (e.g. grandfathered-in retirement only, Luther Seminary, Global Missions, etc.).

Hopefully congregational leaders and rostered leaders have had or will have the needed conversations about what the health care needs of the rostered person are and which health care plan provides those. The Gold+ plan is the closest to continuing the benefits that rostered leaders currently receive under the plan now in effect.

Have those conversations now, before the October 14 deadline arrives.

 

A Health Care Planning Tool

Pastor Jerry O’Neal, Calvary Lutheran Church, Bluffton, Indiana, has developed a Health Care Planning Tool for rostered leaders and congregations to use in finding the most cost efficient plan for the congregation and the rostered leader.

Essentially, the tool asks you to take the following steps:

1. With your congregation(s), decide on a total compensation package for you, including all benefits (health care, pension, continuing education, professional expenses, etc.).  Use the I-K Synod’s Compensation Standards document and the Gold+ plan from the myPortico page in determining the dollar amount for this total package.
2. Given this total amount, use the Health Care Planning Tool to estimate the total health expenses for you and the congregation(s).  Follow the instructions on the “Instruction” page of the tool.
3. The tool will tell you which of the four plans is the most cost-efficient for you and the congregation(s).  This would be the plan you and your congregation(s) would select (on myPortico and EmployerLink, respectively).

A couple of important caveats on this tool:

1. This tool only gives an estimate of health care costs for 2014.  It does this by asking how much you and your family spent on health care in the last 12 months.  You can use Quicken (use the “Reports” section) or your 2012 federal tax return if you itemized deductions.
2. The tool does NOT take prescription drug costs into account.
3. If you used very little health care in the past, the tool will recommend Bronze+.  I do NOT recommend Bronze+, because it puts too much financial liability on you and your family; I would recommend Silver+ instead.  The only case where I would recommend Bronze+ is if you have a large amount of money already stored in a Health Savings Account ($5,000+ for an individual or $10,000+ for a family).
4. The tool does NOT consider health plans on the statewide health exchanges.  You will need to compare these plans separately.  One important note about the exchanges:  if you purchase health care through them, you will pay your premiums in after-tax dollars.  (Your congregation pays your medical premiums to Portico using before-tax dollars.)

Again, you can find the Health Care Planning Tool at the following link:  http://www.iksynod.org/Resources/Portico/porticoresources.html.  I hope you find this tool helpful, and I am open to any comments or changes you might suggest.  If you have questions or suggestions, please call me at (260) 307-1345 or email me at pastorcalvary@adamswells.com.  God be with you and your congregation(s) as you make these important health care decisions!

Blessings,

Jerry O’Neal

Pastor, Calvary Lutheran Church, Bluffton, IN

I-K Stewardship Leader

myPortico

myPortico is the website for sponsored members of Portico. All rostered leaders who are in the ELCA sponsored health plan should register. Go to https://myportico.porticobenefits.org/WhyRegister.aspx to find out the benefit and advantage of registering. As this website says, “You must be registered on myPortico to have access to important benefit details and enrollment opportunities.”

As rostered leaders look ahead to making choices with their congregational leadership about their health care, registering is a must. Rostered leaders also should encourage their congregation’s leaders to register the congregation at EmployerLink — the website that employers (congregations) will have to access to make those same health care choices.

You may go to https://myportico.porticobenefits.org/SupportCenter/Help/Registration.aspx to learn more about how to register.

For more information about how Portico is responding to Health Care Reform and how that affects you, go to https://myportico.porticobenefits.org/NewsEvents/HealthcareReform.aspx?ctrl=tabs-healthreform&focus=healthreformelcaphilosophyofbenefits.

Why Financial Health

Thanks for dropping by. We are here for immediate and long-range concerns.

Immediately, the Affordable Health Care Act (AHCA) will change the way congregations make decisions about health coverage for their staff — rostered leaders and lay staff. In October, every congregation will have to post on the Portico web site (www.porticobenefits.org) the plan they are offering to their staff. They will choose from Platinum, Gold, Silver or Bronze (these are the categories the AHCA is using and Portico decided to use the same titles). Rostered leaders and lay staff will then have to go to the web site in November and ‘accept’ the plan offered or choose a different plan (any additional cost covered by the member and not the congregation).

Obviously, there needs to be conversation between staff and congregational leadership prior to October. Our immediate concern is to encourage that conversation.

To aid in that conversation, we will post articles and resources to empower, equip and encourage rostered leaders to initiate those conversations.

Long term, we hope to empower, equip, and encourage rostered leaders to live healthy financial lives — generous, compassionate and wise. Again, we will provide articles, resources and links toward that end.

Test

We will be walking together through health care reform.