1199SEIU Funds 330 West 42nd Street New York, NY 10036-6977 www.1199SEIUFunds.org
Non-Profit U.S. Postage PAID New York, NY Permit No. 3700
ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED
Winter 2011
Child Care Corporation Gala Raises Awareness and Funds to Support Healthy Children Supporting children’s healthy development is a cornerstone of the 1199SEIU/Employer Child Care Fund’s mission. Providing children and their families with the tools that they need to live well, like nutritious diets and plenty of exercise, has always been an integral part of the Child Care Fund’s regular child care and youth programs. First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign inspired us to place greater emphasis on raising awareness about the childhood obesity epidemic. In that spirit, the Child Care Corporation’s Fourth Annual Care for Kids Awards Gala honored those recognized leaders whose efforts have helped improve the health of children and families, including Danny Glover, actor and UNICEF Ambassador, who received the Lifetime Achievement Award for his humanitarian and philanthropic efforts focused on HIV/AIDS in children. The gala also honored Dr. Philip Ozuah, Physician-in-Chief of the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore Medical Center and Professor and University Chairman of the Departments of Pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Medical Center, with the Care for Kids Distinguished Service Award for his work as a staunch advocate for children’s health. Nancy Kolben, Executive Director of the Center for Children’s Initiatives, was presented with the Care for Kids Crusader Award for her leadership in early child care policy and education. The gala, held on December 6, 2010, at the Tribeca Rooftop in New York City, was attended by approximately 300 people and raised critical funds to support the CCC’s ongoing advocacy, education and professional development programs for the children and families we serve. “We have worked hard to develop a broad-based portfolio of educational programs and services designed to enrich the growth and development of our children and to keep them healthy and fit,” CCC President Vivian Fox told the event’s attendees. “Part of keeping them fit means we must recognize the serious nature of childhood obesity.”
For close to 20 years, our programs have helped support and educate more than 120,000 children of 1199SEIU members – children who have grown into strong, productive members of their communities.
FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS New Website Design At your 1199SEIU Funds, we know just how much each contributed dollar means. We keep this at the forefront of our daily work, managing resources carefully to provide the most cost-effective benefits and programs that support your employees’ health, retirement security, professional development and family life. We were hard at work over the holiday season – providing 1199SEIU members with the quality benefits your contributions support and figuring out creative ways to maximize those contributions to strengthen the delivery of our services. In this issue of 1199SEIU Employer News, you will read some of what we have accomplished. The leadership of our National Benefit Fund has been leveraging new funding through the federal health reform act, tightening our administrative budget and implementing the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requirements. In the field, our Training and Employment Funds have been leading an ongoing Infection Prevention Campaign that brings workers and management together to dramatically improve patient outcomes, which, as a result, improves our institutions’ bottom lines. On the home front, our Child Care Corporation raised critical funds at our Fourth Annual Gala to expand the reach of our successful programs to members and other working families who are not eligible for 1199SEIU child care benefits – in order to help their children grow up healthy and strong. The year may have just begun, but we are already looking ahead to better carry on our mission in the coming months, such as the unveiling of our updated website with interactive capacity for both providers and members to safely and securely access claims and eligibility information online. As always, we look forward to working with you throughout the year to provide the highest level of service to our members, our institutions, our communities and our industry. Sincerely,
Mitra Behroozi Executive Director Benefit and Pension Funds
Deborah King Executive Director Training and Employment Funds
Vivian Fox Executive Director Child Care Funds
Features Provider Portal The 1199SEIU Funds kicked off 2011 with a redesigned website that includes many improvements targeted to members and providers, including a simplified navigation menu and a user-friendly Tool Center. The new www.1199SEIUFunds.org has been designed so that fewer clicks are required to get users where they want to go, and drop-down menus from the navigation bar will help users pinpoint the precise location of key information rather than forcing page-to-page searches. As an employer, your Human Resources staff will be able to better find and access benefit information. And if you are also a National Benefit Fund provider, one of the exciting new features the site offers to you is a new portal through which you can quickly and easily handle your accounts receivable and establish member eligibility without having to call the Fund. And for your 1199SEIU employees, there is a useful new Personal Information Account feature, which allows them to create a secure account through which to view their personal health and benefit information, such as eligibility and medical claims. The improved self-service capability offered through the Personal Information Account feature can save your employees time on the phone or a trip to our Member Services Department at 330 West 42nd Street, Manhattan. We hope you and your employees will take advantage of accessing Funds information through the new site in 2011!
Disciplined Budget, Creative Funding Prepare NBF for a Challenging Year Ahead Even with the most rigorous fiscal planning, we know that each new year will bring unavoidable new costs. And in this economic climate, the ability to manage those costs makes all the difference in protecting your employees’ benefits. So the National Benefit Fund’s leadership spent the past year examining every avenue for administrative savings and pursuing new funding opportunities to support our programs and services. This planning is now paying off as we work to implement the requirements of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) and will also help us manage the required wage and benefit contribution increase for Fund staff.While 2011 will still be a challenging year, we are beginning it on solid ground, with our tightest administrative budget in years.
NBF Administrative Costs Fall Below 6% Flat Budget Represents Leanest-Ever Spending In the face of another financially challenging year for the industry, the NBF leadership worked hard to develop the leanest possible administrative budget for 2011. On December 16, the Trustees approved a budget that represents a 0.1% decrease over 2010, keeping our administrative budget flat for the second year in a row. Despite unavoidable cost increases – most significantly a 2% wage and 4.3% benefit contribution increase for staff required by the League’s Collective Bargaining Agreement – this budget tightly manages operational costs while still maintaining the quality of our services. This means that while our Benefit Funds pay out more than $1.5 billion in benefit claims each year, we will administer these benefits in 2011 for less than 6% of the Benefit Funds’ total spending.This is dramatically less than commercial and even other non-profit plans, and keeps us well below the 15% to 20% threshold that the PPACA will now require commercial insurers to meet.
January Brings Health Reform Changes to the NBF As of January 1, 2011, coverage for dependent children has been extended up to age 26 and lifetime benefit maximums were eliminated.
13,354 Young Adults Enroll in National Benefit Fund The Fund spent the fall months actively reaching out to eligible members and enrolled a total of 13,354 young adult dependents – 12,306 who had aged out and re-enrolled and 1,248 who are new to Fund coverage.
Members Can Still Enroll Young Adult Dependents If there are employees at your institution who have not enrolled newly eligible dependents, they can still take advantage of this extended coverage by filling out a special Young Adult Dependent Enrollment Form. Enrollment will be continuous, but coverage will not begin until the first day of the month that follows 30 days after we receive their form. These forms are available on our website (www.1199SEIUBenefits.org), from your Outreach Coordinator or by calling our Member Services Representatives at (646) 473-9200 to request one.
Maximums on Benefit Costs End Effective January 1, 2011, PPACA required that all plans eliminate any lifetime or annual maximums. For the National Benefit Fund, that meant an end to the $1,000,000 lifetime maximum for beneficiaries enrolled in Member Choice and cost limits on biotech medications and newborn medical care. To help manage and coordinate the care of approximately 40 members affected by this change, our Care Management staff is working closely with them to transition them back into the Fund if they still need the coverage. And if any of your 1199SEIU employees are among the few who have reached the lifetime or any of the other maximums, they can still contact the Fund’s Care Management Department at (646) 473-7446 to discuss transitioning back into their Fund coverage, subject to eligibility.
NBF’s Cost Containment Strategies Secure $2 Million in Early Retiree Funding to Date In December, the National Benefit Fund received $2.06 million in funding through the PPACA Early Retiree Reinsurance Program. This funding provides support to employers and Taft-Hartley plans that help their early retirees bridge the healthcare gap between leaving work and becoming eligible for Medicare. It is anticipated that the Fund will secure nearly $15 million by the end of 2011 from the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program. 2 EMPLOYER NEWS Winter 2011
In order to win a share of the $5 billion funding pool, plans were required to demonstrate that they provided early retiree benefits and had meaningful programs in place to control the costs of chronic and high-cost medical conditions for their participants. With years of successful cost containment programs in place, our National Benefit Fund’s plan was a strong candidate to secure this funding.
Labor Management Partnership Saves Lives and Strengthens Institutions’ Bottom Lines For the past several years, the Labor Management Project’s successful Infection Prevention Campaign (IPC) reduced hospital-based infections and improved patient outcomes. And just as importantly in this challenging year, this campaign through our Training and Employment Funds means that 1199SEIU/League institutions are not just making huge strides in safeguarding patients’ lives but also in containing costs. The IPC trains interdisciplinary coaches to work as peer trainers in their institutions. Armed with the tools they need to help improve hand hygiene, environmental cleanliness and flu vaccination rates, coaches in 17 hospitals have seen dramatic results. By teaming up with labor and management across departments, hand hygiene compliance rates are increasing. For example, Dr. Brian Koll, M.D., Medical Director and Chief, Infection Prevention at Beth Israel Medical Center, reports that compliance rates are up 95 percent. This translated into a reduction in hospital-acquired Clostridium difficile infections (CDI). (See chart to the right). CDI reduction means both improved patient outcomes and cost savings.
Beth Israel IPC Campaign Results Hospital Acquired CDI
In addition to worksite activities, the Labor Management Project recently hosted the Working Together for Quality and Service Conference for 200 union and management representatives and Infection Prevention Coaches from 20 hospitals. Conference attendees interacted with panels of COOs, infection prevention practitioners, coaches and other union and management representatives. The conference focused on strategies to address culture change and on the importance of moving toward a structure where everyone, from workers to management, is equally committed to and responsible for preventing hospital-acquired infections. To get your institution involved, or to request materials, contact Daniel Bustillo (Daniel.Bustillo@labormanagementproject.org).
Winter 2011 EMPLOYER NEWS 3
Disciplined Budget, Creative Funding Prepare NBF for a Challenging Year Ahead Even with the most rigorous fiscal planning, we know that each new year will bring unavoidable new costs. And in this economic climate, the ability to manage those costs makes all the difference in protecting your employees’ benefits. So the National Benefit Fund’s leadership spent the past year examining every avenue for administrative savings and pursuing new funding opportunities to support our programs and services. This planning is now paying off as we work to implement the requirements of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) and will also help us manage the required wage and benefit contribution increase for Fund staff.While 2011 will still be a challenging year, we are beginning it on solid ground, with our tightest administrative budget in years.
NBF Administrative Costs Fall Below 6% Flat Budget Represents Leanest-Ever Spending In the face of another financially challenging year for the industry, the NBF leadership worked hard to develop the leanest possible administrative budget for 2011. On December 16, the Trustees approved a budget that represents a 0.1% decrease over 2010, keeping our administrative budget flat for the second year in a row. Despite unavoidable cost increases – most significantly a 2% wage and 4.3% benefit contribution increase for staff required by the League’s Collective Bargaining Agreement – this budget tightly manages operational costs while still maintaining the quality of our services. This means that while our Benefit Funds pay out more than $1.5 billion in benefit claims each year, we will administer these benefits in 2011 for less than 6% of the Benefit Funds’ total spending.This is dramatically less than commercial and even other non-profit plans, and keeps us well below the 15% to 20% threshold that the PPACA will now require commercial insurers to meet.
January Brings Health Reform Changes to the NBF As of January 1, 2011, coverage for dependent children has been extended up to age 26 and lifetime benefit maximums were eliminated.
13,354 Young Adults Enroll in National Benefit Fund The Fund spent the fall months actively reaching out to eligible members and enrolled a total of 13,354 young adult dependents – 12,306 who had aged out and re-enrolled and 1,248 who are new to Fund coverage.
Members Can Still Enroll Young Adult Dependents If there are employees at your institution who have not enrolled newly eligible dependents, they can still take advantage of this extended coverage by filling out a special Young Adult Dependent Enrollment Form. Enrollment will be continuous, but coverage will not begin until the first day of the month that follows 30 days after we receive their form. These forms are available on our website (www.1199SEIUBenefits.org), from your Outreach Coordinator or by calling our Member Services Representatives at (646) 473-9200 to request one.
Labor Management Partnership Saves Lives and Strengthens Institutions’ Bottom Lines For the past several years, the Labor Management Project’s successful Infection Prevention Campaign (IPC) reduced hospital-based infections and improved patient outcomes. And just as importantly in this challenging year, this campaign through our Training and Employment Funds means that 1199SEIU/League institutions are not just making huge strides in safeguarding patients’ lives but also in containing costs. The IPC trains interdisciplinary coaches to work as peer trainers in their institutions. Armed with the tools they need to help improve hand hygiene, environmental cleanliness and flu vaccination rates, coaches in 17 hospitals have seen dramatic results. By teaming up with labor and management across departments, hand hygiene compliance rates are increasing. For example, Dr. Brian Koll, M.D., Medical Director and Chief, Infection Prevention at Beth Israel Medical Center, reports that compliance rates are up 95 percent. This
translated into a reduction in hospital-acquired Clostridium difficile infections (CDI). (See chart below). CDI reduction means both improved patient outcomes and cost savings. In addition to worksite activities, the Labor Management Project recently hosted the Working Together for Quality and Service Conference for 200 union and management representatives and Infection Prevention Coaches from 20 hospitals. Conference attendees interacted with panels of COOs, infection prevention practitioners, coaches and other union and management representatives. The conference focused on strategies to address culture change and on the importance of moving toward a structure where everyone, from workers to management, is equally committed to and responsible for preventing hospital-acquired infections.
To get your institution involved, or to request materials, contact Daniel Bustillo (Daniel.Bustillo@labormanagementproject.org).
Maximums on Benefit Costs End Effective January 1, 2011, PPACA required that all plans eliminate any lifetime or annual maximums. For the National Benefit Fund, that meant an end to the $1,000,000 lifetime maximum for beneficiaries enrolled in Member Choice and cost limits on biotech medications and newborn medical care. To help manage and coordinate the care of approximately 40 members affected by this change, our Care Management staff is working closely with them to transition them back into the Fund if they still need the coverage.
Beth Israel IPC Campaign Results Hospital Acquired CDI
And if any of your 1199SEIU employees are among the few who have reached the lifetime or any of the other maximums, they can still contact the Fund’s Care Management Department at (646) 473-7446 to discuss transitioning back into their Fund coverage, subject to eligibility.
NBF’s Cost Containment Strategies Secure $2 Million in Early Retiree Funding to Date In December, the National Benefit Fund received $2.06 million in funding through the PPACA Early Retiree Reinsurance Program. This funding provides support to employers and Taft-Hartley plans that help their early retirees bridge the healthcare gap between leaving work and becoming eligible for Medicare. It is anticipated that the Fund will secure nearly $15 million by the end of 2011 from the Early Retiree Reinsurance Program. 2 EMPLOYER NEWS Winter 2011
In order to win a share of the $5 billion funding pool, plans were required to demonstrate that they provided early retiree benefits and had meaningful programs in place to control the costs of chronic and high-cost medical conditions for their participants. With years of successful cost containment programs in place, our National Benefit Fund’s plan was a strong candidate to secure this funding.
Winter 2011 EMPLOYER NEWS 3
1199SEIU Funds 330 West 42nd Street New York, NY 10036-6977 www.1199SEIUFunds.org
Non-Profit U.S. Postage PAID New York, NY Permit No. 3700
ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED
Winter 2011
Child Care Corporation Gala Raises Awareness and Funds to Support Healthy Children Supporting children’s healthy development is a cornerstone of the 1199SEIU/Employer Child Care Fund’s mission. Providing children and their families with the tools that they need to live well, like nutritious diets and plenty of exercise, has always been an integral part of the Child Care Fund’s regular child care and youth programs. First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign inspired us to place greater emphasis on raising awareness about the childhood obesity epidemic. In that spirit, the Child Care Corporation’s Fourth Annual Care for Kids Awards Gala honored those recognized leaders whose efforts have helped improve the health of children and families, including Danny Glover, actor and UNICEF Ambassador, who received the Lifetime Achievement Award for his humanitarian and philanthropic efforts focused on HIV/AIDS in children. The gala also honored Dr. Philip Ozuah, Physician-in-Chief of the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore Medical Center and Professor and University Chairman of the Departments of Pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Medical Center, with the Care for Kids Distinguished Service Award for his work as a staunch advocate for children’s health. Nancy Kolben, Executive Director of the Center for Children’s Initiatives, was presented with the Care for Kids Crusader Award for her leadership in early child care policy and education.
For close to 20 years, our programs have helped support and educate more than 120,000 children of 1199SEIU members – children who have grown into strong, productive members of their communities.
At your 1199SEIU Funds, we know just how much each contributed dollar means. We keep this at the forefront of our daily work, managing resources carefully to provide the most cost-effective benefits and programs that support your employees’ health, retirement security, professional development and family life. We were hard at work over the holiday season – providing 1199SEIU members with the quality benefits your contributions support and figuring out creative ways to maximize those contributions to strengthen the delivery of our services. In this issue of 1199SEIU Employer News, you will read some of what we have accomplished. The leadership of our National Benefit Fund has been leveraging new funding through the federal health reform act, tightening our administrative budget and implementing the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requirements. In the field, our Training and Employment Funds have been leading an ongoing Infection Prevention Campaign that brings workers and management together to dramatically improve patient outcomes, which, as a result, improves our institutions’ bottom lines. On the home front, our Child Care Corporation raised critical funds at our Fourth Annual Gala to expand the reach of our successful programs to members and other working families who are not eligible for 1199SEIU child care benefits – in order to help their children grow up healthy and strong. The year may have just begun, but we are already looking ahead to better carry on our mission in the coming months, such as the unveiling of our updated website with interactive capacity for both providers and members to safely and securely access claims and eligibility information online. As always, we look forward to working with you throughout the year to provide the highest level of service to our members, our institutions, our communities and our industry.
The gala, held on December 6, 2010, at the Tribeca Rooftop in New York City, was attended by approximately 300 people and raised critical funds to support the CCC’s ongoing advocacy, education and professional development programs for the children and families we serve. “We have worked hard to develop a broad-based portfolio of educational programs and services designed to enrich the growth and development of our children and to keep them healthy and fit,” CCC President Vivian Fox told the event’s attendees. “Part of keeping them fit means we must recognize the serious nature of childhood obesity.”
FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS New Website Design
Sincerely,
Actor Danny Glover, CCC President Vivian Fox and Montefiore Medical Center's Dr. Philip Ozuah
Mitra Behroozi Executive Director Benefit and Pension Funds
Deborah King Executive Director Training and Employment Funds
Vivian Fox Executive Director Child Care Funds
Features Provider Portal The 1199SEIU Funds kicked off 2011 with a redesigned website that includes many improvements targeted to members and providers, including a simplified navigation menu and a user-friendly Tool Center. The new www.1199SEIUFunds.org has been designed so that fewer clicks are required to get users where they want to go, and drop-down menus from the navigation bar will help users pinpoint the precise location of key information rather than forcing page-to-page searches. As an employer, your Human Resources staff will be able to better find and access benefit information. And if you are also a National Benefit Fund provider, one of the exciting new features the site offers to you is a new portal through which you can quickly and easily handle your accounts receivable and establish member eligibility without having to call the Fund. And for your 1199SEIU employees, there is a useful new Personal Information Account feature, which allows them to create a secure account through which to view their personal health and benefit information, such as eligibility and medical claims. The improved self-service capability offered through the Personal Information Account feature can save your employees time on the phone or a trip to our Member Services Department at 330 West 42nd Street, Manhattan. We hope you and your employees will take advantage of accessing Funds information through the new site in 2011!