Pacific Employers Alliance Trust to offer innovative insurance package to Washington small business
- New Multi-Choice package from UnitedHealthcare provides small businesses with cost-effective and flexible insurance options
- Employees can select from an array of health plan options, enabling workers to choose a plan that matches their personal financial and coverage needs
- Washington among the first states nationwide with Multi-Choice
Pacific Employers Alliance Trust (PEAT), an independent, member-governed group that provides health insurance and other employee benefits to small businesses in Washington state, announced an innovative health plan package that enables employers to offer their workers multiple health plan choices.
The package, called Multi-Choice, is available through PEAT as a result of its collaboration with UnitedHealthcare, one of the state’s largest health insurers. Multi-Choice is available now to PEAT employers, which have between five and 50 enrolled employees. Today, Multi-Choice is available in only a handful of markets, including Washington, California and Massachusetts.
Under this innovative approach, employers offer workers a package of as many as 11 different health plan designs. By comparison, most small employers currently offer their workers a limited number of plan options, typically one or two plan designs.
Employers selecting Multi-Choice can choose a package of benefit designs and set a defined contribution level for those options, and then each employee can select a plan that best meets his or her needs. This flexibility makes offering health insurance more cost-effective and financially predictable, which helps small-business owners to offer or maintain coverage for their workers.
An estimated 60 percent of the 47 million Americans without health insurance are employed by small businesses, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
“PEAT members now have a new tool that will enable them to provide the right coverage levels to each employee while still controlling costs,” said Lynn Withrow, PEAT founder and trustee. “We are proud to offer our members an innovative health insurance plan that uniquely meets the needs of both the employer and their employees. This plan can play a part in improving health care access and affordability in this state.”
Employees enrolled in Multi-Choice will have an array of plan options, including traditional benefit designs with various premium, deductible and coinsurance levels, and consumer-driven plan designs such as a health savings account (HSA) or health reimbursement account (HRA). In addition, Multi-Choice leverages advanced technology that enables employers to easily manage their health benefits, including paying bills, adding employees and selecting plan designs.
“Multi-Choice is among the most innovative insurance plans currently available to employers,” said David Hansen, CEO, Pacific Region of UnitedHealthcare. “We are giving small business owners in Washington a new health insurance option that helps them better manage costs while simultaneously providing flexibility and choice to their workers.”
About Pacific Employer Alliance Trust
PEAT is an independent, member-governed group formed specifically to help provide quality health insurance and other employee benefits to businesses in Washington with at least five enrolled employees. By underwriting each employer and consolidating many smaller businesses into one large group, PEAT gives small businesses operating in a range of industries, including agriculture, finance and technology, the purchasing power to get “big company” pricing on quality health care options.