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June 2015

THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT:

What happens when employees decline your coverage PAGE 5 >

BUSINESS OF BENEFITS: WORKPLACE WELLNESS PAGE 8 >

MyAnthem

NEWS

Featured Articles

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A new look and shorter, customized content in our next newsletterHave you noticed? We’re rolling out some

exciting changes to MyAnthem News in

2015. We’ve already moved from a quarterly

to a bi-monthly schedule this year, and our

newsletter will look different the next time

you get it. With our August issue, we’re

launching a new digital enewsletter design

that’s easier to read and navigate. With the

new design, you’ll get a better, broader

experience. Best of all, you can read it

anywhere on your mobile devices, like tablets

or smartphones! And you can share and

interact with stories through social media.

Shorter, easy-to-scan articles will feature

images and videos. With a focus on top-of-

mind topics like cost of care, health care

reform, and health and wellness, our new

enewsletter will have content customized to

your group size. With a simple click or tap,

you’ll be able to share articles easily with your

employees. And all articles will be archived

for later reference, if you need them.

Stay tuned for our new enewsletter, coming in

August to your inbox!

To access an archived issue from earlier

this year, please contact your sales

representative.

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Also in this issue of MyAnthem News:FEATURED ARTICLES:

5 > The Affordable Care Act: What happens when employees decline your coverage

7 > Introducing Anthem Whole Health Connection

8 > Business of Benefits: Workplace wellness

10 > Health care coverage shopping tips for your employees

12 > Looking for free and easy-to-use wellness resources? Check out Time Well Spent!

15 > Your employees may get a confidential call from us

WISCONSIN NEWS:

16 > A New Mantra: 80 by ’18

Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of: In Colorado: Rocky Mountain Hospital and Medical Service, Inc. HMO products underwritten by HMO Colorado, Inc. In Connecticut: Anthem Health Plans, Inc. In Indiana: Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. In Kentucky: Anthem Health Plans of Kentucky, Inc. In Maine: Anthem Health Plans of Maine, Inc. In Missouri (excluding 30 counties in the Kansas City area): RightCHOICE® Managed Care, Inc. (RIT), Healthy Alliance® Life Insurance Company (HALIC), and HMO Missouri, Inc. RIT and certain affiliates administer non-HMO benefits underwritten by HALIC and HMO benefits underwritten by HMO Missouri, Inc. RIT and certain affiliates only provide administrative services for self-funded plans and do not underwrite benefits. In Nevada: Rocky Mountain Hospital and Medical Service, Inc. HMO products underwritten by HMO Colorado, Inc., dba HMO Nevada. In New Hampshire: Anthem Health Plans of New Hampshire, Inc. HMO plans are administered by Anthem Health Plans of New Hampshire, Inc. and underwritten by Matthew Thornton Health Plan, Inc. In Ohio: Community Insurance Company. In Virginia: Anthem Health Plans of Virginia, Inc. trades as Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Virginia, and its service area is all of Virginia except for the City of Fairfax, the Town of Vienna, and the area east of State Route 123. In Wisconsin: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Wisconsin (BCBSWi), which underwrites or administers the PPO and indemnity policies; Compcare Health Services Insurance Corporation (Compcare), which underwrites or administers the HMO policies; and Compcare and BCBSWi collectively, which underwrite or administer the POS policies. Independent licensees of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. ®ANTHEM is a registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. The Blue Cross and Blue Shield names and symbols are registered marks of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.

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Featured Articles

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THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT:

What happens when employees decline your coverageBeginning in 2016, employers who have 50 or more full-time or full-time-equivalent employees are required to

offer health insurance to these employees under the Affordable Care Act. Employees, however, do not have to

accept the insurance, and inevitably, some will turn it down. The consequences for a business if an employee

declines the employer-sponsored coverage depend on the nature of the health insurance offered and what

employees do instead.

Plan coverage requirements

The Affordable Care Act requires health plans to cover at least 60 percent of the cost of services on average in

order to qualify as minimum coverage (also known as the Bronze plan), according to Kaiser Family Foundation.

In addition, coverage needs to be affordable, meaning that employee contributions are limited to 9.5 percent or

less of household income, and plans must be offered to at least 95 percent of full-time employees.

What situations do not trigger penalties?

Regardless of your plan type, some scenarios will never trigger penalties. If you have employees who join their

spouses’ plans, you will not be penalized.

What causes a company to incur a penalty?

The real difficulties arise if your company doesn’t offer minimum essential coverage and full-time employees

end up qualifying for government subsidies when seeking coverage at federal or state health insurance

marketplaces (sometimes called “exchanges”). Starting in 2016, businesses with at least 50 full-time employees

will be subject to penalties if even one of their employees receives a subsidy, according to the IRS.

Employers that offer high-quality, affordable coverage to essentially all of their full-time employees can be

confident that they will not face penalties, even if some employees decide not to participate in the plan.

Excerpted from an article by David E. Williams featured on our Making Health Care Reform Work blog.

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Featured Articles

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Introducing Anthem Whole Health Connection Connected care means better care for you and your employees

Health care should serve the whole person – head to toe, at each stage of life.

With Anthem Whole Health ConnectionSM, we’re connecting our health, pharmacy,

dental, vision, life, and disability plans – resulting in better health and a simplified

experience for you and your employees. Employees get complete care while you

enjoy the ease of working with one account team – meaning less administrative

hassle and less energy managing different plans.

Our health care plans work in tandem with patients and providers in a new way.

Through the portfolio, we get claims and clinical data from dentists, eye doctors,

primary care doctors and care coordinators. Then, we securely share relevant patient

information back to network providers through electronic health records, including

patient summaries, diagnoses, lab results and prescriptions. This shared data allows

us to create more complete member health profiles, which help identify gaps in care

and lead to the delivery of better, more informed care by providers.

Check out this new video and flier to learn more. And then start a conversation with

your Anthem sales representative or visit anthem.com/specialty.

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Featured Articles

Business of Benefits: Workplace wellnessAre you thinking about starting a

wellness program for your office,

or are you looking for some advice

on how to make your current

program more effective? There

are three main steps to follow in

order to lay the groundwork. By

using these tips and tricks, you’ll

see your office transform into a

healthier environment. To gain

even more insight on optimizing

your wellness program, check out

#businessofbenefits on Twitter.

CLICK ANY OF THESE IMAGES FOR MORE INFORMATION

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Featured Articles

Health care coverage shopping tips for your employeesAmericans are natural shoppers. We

like to find the best deal on pretty

much everything we buy — except our

health care coverage. When it comes

to health care, people don’t really think

about looking for a good deal, and this

can be costly for your company and

your employees. To help keep costs

under control, there are a few effective

shopping tips that you can share with

employees.

Use online shopping tools. The Internet

has made finding deals on health care

coverage much easier. FAIR Health

and Healthcare Bluebook list the

average prices of medical services and

procedures. Whenever your employees

need treatment, recommend that they

double-check the price with these

websites to make sure they’re being

treated fairly.

Ask for lower-cost options. There are

ways to get the same quality health care

coverage at a lower cost.

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Stay in the network. Your health care plan

will have a network of qualified providers.

Most plans let your employees see out-of-

network providers, but the costs will be

higher.

Avoid unnecessary procedures. Doctors

may sometimes prescribe procedures

to avoid liability or to receive a fee —

not necessarily because it’s medically

necessary. In a poll of more than 50

medical societies, doctors said annual

Pap smears, regular PSA tests for prostate

cancer, regular EKGs for people with no

history of heart disease and MRIs for back

pain were some of the most unnecessary

procedures.

By following these shopping tips, you and

your employees will be able to put a dent

in your costs and leave more money in all

of your pockets.

Excerpted from an article by David Rodeck

featured on our Making Health Care

Reform Work blog.

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Looking for free and easy-to-use wellness resources? Check out Time Well Spent!When employees are healthy, they’re likely to

remain productive on the job and be less costly

than unhealthy employees.* That’s where Time

Well Spent comes in. This easy-to-use online

resource is designed to help you create or

improve your workplace wellness strategy. It’s

available free of charge and includes turnkey

wellness campaigns, health education resources

and more to help make planning your wellness

strategy simple.

Think of Time Well Spent as your own health

library

It gives you materials and toolkits to help educate

your employees on ways to improve their overall

health and well-being. When you visit the website,

you’ll find resources on a variety of health topics,

such as chronic conditions, nutrition and physical

activity, quitting smoking and more.

You can use them whenever and however they

work best for your organization. You can email

materials, print them out and leave them in

high traffic areas, or use them in employee

newsletters or mailings.

NEW! Create healthy eating habits with our

LunchWell campaign

LunchWell is a communications campaign to

help your employees create healthy eating habits

by making small changes in how they eat – and

think about – lunch. The materials are grouped by

topic and you’ll find a comprehensive employer

guide to make it simple for you to roll out this

campaign in your workplace.

See how Time Well Spent

can make a difference in

your workplace. Click for

more information.

Not sure where to start?

Check out this online tutorial.

In just five minutes, you can get

suggestions on ways to use the

Time Well Spent materials and

get pointed to resources that

could help.

* Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website: Workplace health programs can increase productivity (accessed April 2015): cdc.gov.workplacehealthpromotion/businesscase/benefits/productivity.html.

Featured Articles

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Featured Articles

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Your employees may get a confidential call from usWe care about your employees’ health and about helping them feel better.

Because we care, we may call them from time to time. For example, we

might reach out to help with things like:

~ Health issues that may include weight loss, tobacco cessation or

making healthier lifestyle choices

~ Preparing for surgery

~ Important health reminders, including appointments

~ No-cost health programs, like introducing a pregnant employee to

our maternity management program, which could help her have a

healthier pregnancy

The health and wellness programs we offer cost nothing extra, and when

we talk to your employees, we explain how they work with their health

plan. Our calls are always meant to be helpful and are always confidential.

We make sure of that by verifying the date of birth and address of the

person when we call.

Our phone calls make a big difference

About 92 percent of people who talked with our health and wellness team

members were satisfied with the support they received.* And, of course,

if your employees prefer not to get calls from us, they can contact our

Customer Service team to opt out.

* Internal study, 3-year comparison based on YTD Q2 2014 data.

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A New Mantra: 80 by ’18Sometimes cancer seems like such a massive problem that we feel helpless. As employers,

we’ve all witnessed when a coworker is diagnosed with cancer. There’s confusion, anger,

sadness – but overwhelmingly there is a desire to do something about it. That’s why I joined

the American Cancer Society’s CEOs Against Cancer as the Wisconsin Chair. We want to do

whatever we can to save lives and help employers cope with the financial losses of cancer.

This infographic from the CDC shows that 90% of patients have a survival rate of five years if

the colorectal cancer is caught early, but only 40% of colon cancers are caught in the early

stages. If people only got tested, they could live longer, happier lives. That’s why last year,

many health organizations made a major commitment: increase the country’s colon cancer

testing rate to 80% by 2018. This 80 by ’18 mantra inspires us.

We know that colon cancer is one of only two cancers where screening can actually prevent

cancer from ever starting. However, screening only saves lives IF people get tested! And that’s

the challenge. Let’s face it, many of us are wired for two things – following the path of least

resistance and having fun!

Clearly, a colonoscopy is the opposite of taking the path of least resistance and it certainly is

not fun. But if we can take what we’ve learned from the fight against breast cancer and apply

it to increasing colon cancer screening rates, just imagine the impact we can have and the

lives that could be saved.

So what can you do? Take the pledge to help increase colon cancer screening rates! 80% by

2018 is a big goal, and if we’re going to succeed we need the business community committed

to taking action. Tools and resources are available at the National Colorectal Cancer

Roundtable to help educate your workforce about the importance of cancer screening. You

can make a donation to help fight cancer. And you can help support employees that are

touched by cancer. To get started, use our Cancer Digital Magazine featuring Anthem’s suite

of free resources, available on-demand 24/7, regardless of what health plan you use.

It’s going to take more than a few health care companies to fight this – but together, as an

employer community, we can make a difference!

Excerpted from a discussion by Lawrence Schreiber featured in our Health Benefits

Roundtable LinkedIn Group.

Wisconsin News

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LinkedIn Thought LeaderLawrence SchreiberPresident Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, Wisconsin