UnitedHealthcare’s Total Choice Plans Enable Employees to Customize Their Health Benefits to Meet Their Health and Financial Needs
UnitedHealthcare, a UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:UNH) company, is introducing Total Choice Plans offering the new opportunity for individual employees of mid-sized companies to personalize health benefits based on their unique health care needs, finances and preferences.
Individual employees are able to assess their anticipated or typical use of various health care services — such as routine and preventive care, hospitalizations, prescription-drug use and more — and select the level of out-of-pocket expenses, including annual deductible, co-insurance and co-pays, to create a more personalized health plan that more closely reflects their specific health and financial needs. Through a secure Web page, employees have up to three values to choose from each benefit category as they build a total benefits package. Dental and vision plans are also available.
In addition, Total Choice Plans streamline administrative processes for employers. For example, employee self-service and online transactions may potentially reduce paperwork and the number of routine questions human resources personnel often receive. Also, by allowing employers to define their health benefit contribution level and let their employees “buy-up” necessary benefits, Total Choice Plans enable employers to more effectively gauge their health care benefit costs.
“With UnitedHealthcare’s Total Choice Plans, employers can offer their employees meaningful choices and engage employees in making positive health care decisions,” said Ken Burdick, CEO of UnitedHealthcare. “Evidence suggests that engaged consumers seek information to help them make more informed personal choices about their care and make greater strides in improving their overall health.”
“Total Choice Plans enable mid-sized companies to access and afford health benefit solutions ordinarily reserved for large employers,” said Karen Frost, Health and Welfare Outsourcing Practice Leader of Hewitt Associates. “Large employers find that their employees are more satisfied with their health care benefits when they are able to customize the plan designs to meet their individual health care needs and decide the trade-offs they are willing to make between paycheck deductions and out-of-pocket costs.”
Additionally, Total Choice Plans are coupled with phone- and Web-based tools and resources that help participants reach their health improvement goals, make well-informed health care decisions and better understand the financial aspects of their health care choices. These include plan cost estimators, treatment cost estimators, online health assessments and access to personal health records as well as health coaching programs.
Total Choice Plans are available in Colorado, Louisiana, North Florida and Wisconsin to employers with 100-500 fully insured employees. A national launch is slated for 2008.
“UnitedHealthcare’s Total Choice Plans go above and beyond the kinds of one-size-fits-all benefit plans currently available to mid-sized businesses and offer more flexibility and choice while maintaining affordability and simplifying administration,” said Burdick.
“We believe Total Choice Plans will bring mid-sized companies the opportunity to offer highly competitive health benefits for their employees which, in turn, will increase employee satisfaction while controlling costs,” Frost added. “Also, engaged employees are healthier employees who incur lower costs and are highly satisfied with their health care benefits.”
About UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare (www.unitedhealthcare.com) provides a full spectrum of consumer-oriented health benefit plans and services. The company organizes access to quality, affordable health care services on behalf of more than 26 million individual consumers, contracting directly with more than 535,000 physicians and care professionals and 4,700 hospitals nationwide to offer them broad, convenient access to services nationwide. UnitedHealthcare is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:UNH), a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company.