A disparity exists between what Ohio University’s budget can provide in health care benefits and how much employee benefits will cost the university.
OU’s total health insurance costs for faculty and staff are projected to increase 8.4 percent in the next fiscal year, but the university's budget only has 5 percent of it available for benefits. The allocations are not yet finalized, and the Benefits Advisory Council is working to mitigate the burden of having an increase above what the budget allows.
“The university made a commitment a couple of years ago that as health care costs continue to increase, they were not going to increase their contribution more than 5 percent a year,” Joe McLaughlin, a Benefits Advisory Council member, said. “If we have 7 or 8 (percent) health care inflation, there’s two ways to handle that — either you reduce the benefit, or you pass the costs on to employees.”
The council is working to adjust employee health care plans by January to meet budget requirements set by the Total Compensation Committee, which predicts budget implications and is overseen by the university president.
Faculty and staff are “very concerned” about the cost and access to health care because benefits are a major part of compensation for employees, Benefits Advisory Council Co-chair Susan Williams said.
Over the past three years, the council has made a mix of changes in how employees pay for health care coverage.
Each year, the council works to close the gap in benefits budgeting by “pulling levers” on employee deductibles, co-pays, premiums and out-of-pocket expenses, Chief Human Resource Director Colleen Bendl said.
OU is self-insured for medical and dental insurance and has contracts with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, as well as Express Scripts for Third Party Administration services, the 2017-18 Budget Book reads.
OU employees pay similar premium rates to other colleges and universities in Ohio.
The university has a slightly higher deductible compared to the Inter-University Council, a nonprofit organization that compiles information on Ohio’s 14 public universities, meaning OU covers a greater dollar amount of employee health insurance than the other universities. The out-of-pocket maximum for OU employees is about $1,000 lower than Ohio public universities for both individual and family plans.
Three years ago, employees were surveyed by the council. In that feedback, faculty and staff expressed that they prefer higher deductibles over higher premiums. As a result, there has been more adjustments regarding cost-sharing than on premiums, or money taken out of employee paychecks each month to cover OU’s health insurance.
There will be no “big jumps” in deductibles for fiscal year 2018, Williams said.
“Faculty are hedging their best that they’re going to be healthy and not meet their deductibles,” Williams said.
