Health Care Benefits Don’t Have to Be One Size Fits All

Each of your employees is different, and those differences extend to their health care needs. Traditional “one size fits all” health plans can prove limiting. As an employer, you may have wondered whether you can offer different health care benefits to your employees. You can, with CaliforniaChoice. Our multi-carrier private health insurance exchange includes eight different health plans across California.

Coverage Choice Wherever You Are

With CaliforniaChoice, you and your employees have access to Anthem Blue Cross, Health Net, Kaiser Permanente, and UnitedHealthcare statewide. If you are located in Northern California, you also can choose coverage from Sutter Health Plus and Western Health Advantage. Southern California businesses have added health plan options from Oscar Health in Los Angeles and Orange counties and Sharp Health Plan in the San Diego area. Combined, there are nearly 90 options available, so you and each of your employees can easily find coverage that’s right for their individual or family health care needs.

The provider network for CaliforniaChoice is unparalleled. Each health plan offers a diverse roster of physicians, medical groups, and hospitals. In total, there are 84,355 unique individual health care providers and 389 unique hospitals across the state.

CaliforniaChoice gives your employees the freedom to choose the health plan that’s right for them. One of your employees might select a PPO from Anthem Blue Cross because it includes a favorite doctor or hospital in its network. A second employee might choose coverage from Health Net. Another employee who is looking for a lower copay might select an HMO from Kaiser Permanente or UnitedHealthcare. A fourth employee might prefer a regional plan like Sutter Health Plus, Western Health Advantage, Oscar, or Sharp Health Plan. With CaliforniaChoice, it’s their choice. As an added perk for you, the coverage selected by all of your employees is included in a single bill each month.

Tools to Find the Right Plan

CaliforniaChoice offers several tools to help match your needs to the health plans available through our multi-carrier exchange.

• Automated Choice Profiler: Thisonline assistant give users the ability to review premiums, deductibles, and other out-of-pocket costs (like copays and co-insurance) to get a total estimated cost of coverage. Employees can view side-by-side plan comparisons based on costs, risk, and quality.

• Online Provider Search: This tool takes the guesswork out of finding the right doctor by helping employees find out in advance whether a preferred doctor is part of any of the health plans offered through CaliforniaChoice. It’s easy to search by city or ZIP Code, doctor’s name or gender, health plan, hospital affiliation, language(s) spoken, and distance from a targeted city or ZIP Code (like home or office).

• Online Rx Search: You and your employees can use this tool to match your prescription drug needs to available plans. It’s easy to look up medications alphabetically, by brand or generic drug name, therapeutic class (prescriptions for pain, infection, or treatment of the heart), or health condition.

Employer Cost Control

Beyond giving your employees more options from which to choose, CaliforniaChoice helps you control your employee benefits expenses, too. With Defined Contribution, you choose how much you want to contribute to your employees’ health insurance premium. It’s up to you if you want to choose a Fixed Dollar Amount or a Fixed Percentage Amount (50% to 100%) toward a specific benefit. The contribution for each employee does need to be the same.

Your employees then use your contribution toward the cost of coverage for the plans they like best. It’s like a health care voucher. If employees choose coverage that costs more than you’re contributing, the employees simply pay the difference. The amount you choose is locked-in for the plan year, and you can change it at renewal if you choose.

Get Help from an Agent

A health insurance agent can help you set your contribution amount and discuss available options. Best of all, there’s no cost for an agent’s service. If you do not already have an agent, you can search for one here. You can find additional information on this subject in our prior post, 6 Things to Consider When Choosing an Insurance Agent for Your Business.