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Can We Refuse Health Benefits if EE Ignores OE Requests?

CarolisoCaroliso 352 Posts
in HR & Employment Law Vote Up0Vote Down
We are nearing the end of an on-line Open Enrollment process for health and transportation benefits that concludes with people providing an electronic signature by entering their user name and SS#. We seem to have a handful of folks who are ignoring our various e-mails to get going and complete it. I've told them that if they don't complete the Open Enrollment, at the least their med/dental elections will revert to what they had this year, and FSA will revert to zero, Even this will cause a problem for us because we will have to manually enter their co-pays in order to process them through payroll.

This annoys me and has me wondering what my options are short of standing outside these people's offices until they finish OE, So two questions.

1) in this state we are required to get EE authorization for payroll deductions., Does that apply to increases to medical premiums for plans they have already elected? This is one reason we might have to go to any lengths to make sure they enroll electronically.

2) Not that I would do this (okay, I'm tempted) but could we deny elective benefits to EEs who didn't comply with online Open Enrollment requirements? (assume we are not talking about people who are prevented through health or other reasons from knowing this is something they have to do, and who have the wherewithall to do it).,

Grrr!!!
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Comments

  • 5 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • stilldazedstilldazed 640 Posts
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    If your SPD says that you can roll their current year benefits elections to the next year, then you can. It would be prudent, however, to have something in place that will pass legal scrutiny as proof that they were notified, i.e., signed stmt, evidence of mailing, etc.

    How accessible are these folks? I would suggest (and I have done this in the past) putting together a summary of their current benefits profile, including a message that their failure to make changes will cause their current plan to role to the next year (with associated cost changes), and ask them to sign. Our SPD allows us to do that.

    If your SPD does not have that option, another option might be to check with your insurance company or broker for their experience with other employers. They can be a good source of info.

    best wishes.
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  • BeverleeBeverlee 73 Posts
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    My state, too, requires a signature for payroll deductions. I believe the IRS requires a signed Salary Reduction form- even if waiving your FSA- in order to pretax anything. The SRA we use is only good for the current plan year.

    If your open enrollment package states clearly that all elective benfits will be dropped on Decmeber 31, if enrollment is not complete- then do so. Ours does, although we make allowances for people due to sickness- vacation- training- etc, as long as they let me know in ADVANCE, and we can usually get them done early. You could probably still send a memo indicating the final deadline or discontinuation of benefits.

    Good Luck!


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  • PattiePattie 45 Posts
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    Our state also required a signature as authorization for any payroll deductions - regardless of what they are for.

    One caveat: if your plan would allow you to stop benefits if someone didn't go through the open enrollment process, I would make darn sure that these handful of employees did, in fact, receive your communications about needing to do open enrollment. Otherwise, they can come back and state they were never notified -- which could create another problem.

    I understand your frustration in this process -- you wonder sometimes if you're dealing with adults or kindergarten! Good luck!
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  • CarolisoCaroliso 352 Posts
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    Pattie, everybody, you have no idea! Or sadly, maybe you do...

    I will look into the SPD language, that's a good point.

    For the last five days of the process i sent daily e-mails alerting the specific folks that their med and dental benefits would roll over, and everything else would be zero'd out, if they didn't enroll by the deadline. The last couple of go-rounds I did a return receipt on the e-mail to make sure people were opening the e-mails.

    We wound up with just one person who, while she read my e-mails, didn't get around to the process. I will save that documentation per your suggestions.

    It's just unbelievable how much people drag their feet. And of course it's often the same people who have problems with other deadlines at work, HR and otherwise.... I think we need a therapy or other program targeted to those folks....

    Carol

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  • stilldazedstilldazed 640 Posts
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    I think many of us do understand. Many of us have probably been there & done that. Your only option at this point is to work in a legally defensible manner for your organization. It is really too bad that the procrastinator has caused you excess work, and probably needs the insurance and hasn't taken it so far. The catch is that this individual may be the first to complain later that the invitation to enroll was not clear, not available, yada yada, . . .. For a legally defensible case, you will need evidence that the offer was exended to the worker and the worker refused. If you have IT support for your email and email is all you have, as IT to research the e-trail for when/how the emails were retreived by the worker. Try to match a time clock recording with it or some other electronic transaction in the event you must prove that this employee is one who received the email communications. Deliver the message in person if necessary and have a witness present.

    best wishes.
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