Leadpoint to launch corporate health insurance leads

Leadpoint is to launch corporate health insurance leads after trading private medical insurance leads for over a year. Managing director Nick Chapman says: "Leadpoint has already been successfully trading private medical insurance leads for over a year and adding a corporate health insurance lead vertical is a natural evolution for us."

He adds: “We were constantly being asked by our PMI Lead Buyers whether we could expand into Corporate Health leads so we are pleased to announce that our new lead vertical will be live in the next few weeks.”

LeadPoint currently trades Mortgages, Loans, Private Medical Insurance, Debt Management & IVA leads, with Protection leads due to be launched by the end of the month.

news source : http://www.moneymarketing.co.uk/

New health insurance strategy: Incentives for healthful lifestyles

Starting at 4:15 a.m., Jack Mason works out for two hours a day before he goes to work. Once he gets to the Provo-based Nature's Sunshine Products, the software engineer logs it online. He tries to eat more fruits and vegetables, and steers clear of ice cream, because his work is watching his diet, too.
The program is voluntary, as are the supplement manufacturer's subsidized Weight Watchers meetings, discounts on off-site gym memberships, free blood screens and "lifestyle coaches" that provide employees encouragement to meet their health goals.

But most of the 550 workers participate because it pays off for them and their company: Nature's health insurance costs are risingless than 2 percent a year - instead of the double-digit jumps other employers have seen - saving the company an estimated $5.5 million since 2003.

And employees like Mason - who credits his work-inspired exercise and diet for helping him weather a bad biking accident - earn up to four hours of paid time off every six months and get free health insurance. Those who don't participate in the health screens and goal-setting must pay 15 percent of the premium.

Expect to see more rewards for healthy behavior - and monetary penalties on the unwilling - as Utah employers turn to wellness programs to help them reduce health care costs and boost employee productivity. According to SelectHealth, the state's largest insurer, premiums across the state are expected to jump an average of 10 to 12 percent in 2009. Now's the time many companies are planning theirinsurance plans for next year and, in addition to reducing benefits and shifting costs to employees, many are demanding incentive programs from their insurers and accountability from their employees.

Christine Frazier, Nature's insurance benefits manager, said the traditional insurance model of "if I get sick I can go to the doctor and he can fix my problem" has to go, a belief echoed by lawmakers who are trying to reform Utah's health care system.
When national figures show 70 percent of health care pays for preventable conditions, employees should "feel like they do have a responsibility to address some of these issues before they become chronic," she said.

news source : http://www.sltrib.com/

Is Cost Putting Health Insurance Out of Reach?

When Perry Forrest started working as a truck driver and groundsman for Pike Electric Corp. last month, he and his wife, Jonnie, decided not to take the healthinsurance plan offered by his new employer. "We just can't afford it at this time," Jonnie Forrest said. "Eighty-five dollars a week is a lot of money when you are raising two teenagers." The children -- 16-year-old E.T. and 15-year-old Ashley -- have federally supported health insurance through the state's Family Access to Medical Insurance Security plan, or FAMIS. But the couple have been without health insurance since they both lost their jobs -- and she lost their employer-subsidized family health insurance -- in 2006.

Perry Forrest was unemployed for 18 months. During that time, his wife was self-employed, cleaning houses and taking care of an elderly woman to make ends meet. She's now a stay-at-home mom. They are among the growing number of Virginians without health insurance. According to a report released last month by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, there were more than 964,000 Virginians without healthinsurance in 2005, up 28 percent from more than 752,500 in 2001. Nationally, a total of 47 million Americans don't have health insurance. For those in Virginia who still had insurance, the price that they were paying increased 27 percent in five years, while the median income increased just 8 percent, according to the foundation's report, "Squeezed: How Costs for Insuring Families Are Outpacing Income." Nationally, the out-of-pocket cost for health insurance increased 35 percent from 2001 to 2004.

"Most states are in a similar boat, where family incomes are not at all keeping up with the rising cost of health insurance premiums," said Brian Quinn, foundation program officer. "It makes it clear what employees have known: Paying for their health insurance is taking a bigger bite out of their income. "And as the cost continues to rise, it will be further and further out of reach for many people." In Virginia, the total average family premium rose from $8,104 in 2001 to $10,292 in 2005. Employers picked up three quarters of the premium cost, and employees paid for the rest. Nationwide, the greatest increase was in Oklahoma, where the total cost of premiums paid jumped 50 percent in five years. Premiums aren't the only costs that are going up. "There's co-pays for doctors visits, higher-tiered prescriptions," said Kay Bradley, executive director of the Gloucester-Mathews Free Clinic in Hayes. Some insurance companies recently adopted a new pricing structure for some prescriptions.

Now, instead of paying a low set price, patients are being charged a percentage of the cost of some higher-priced drugs. General spending on health care has consistently grown faster than the economy since the 1960s, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit that provides information and analysis on health care issues. In 2007, the United States spent more than $2.2 trillion -- an average of $7,500 a person -- on health care. That's up from $75 billion --about $356 a person -- in 1970. The effects of the increase in health care costs and health insurance premiums are being felt by the 50 free medical clinics across the state serving Virginians who earn less than 200 percent of the federal poverty level -- about $41,000 a year for a family of four. In the first half of 2007, the wait for a new patient to get an appointment doubled to as much as four weeks at some sites, said Lou Markwith, executive director of the Virginia Association of Free Clinics. The association expects the trend to continue.

"Anecdotally, we are seeing a significant increase already in the first quarter of 2008 in the number of people seeking services," Markwith said. He said the data aren't complete yet. In the first three months of 2008, one Hampton Roads area clinic reported seeing more than 340 new patients, he said. In 2007, the Gloucester-Mathews clinic saw 2,105 patients, up from 1,800 the previous year, Bradley said. The clinic is prepared to take in 30 new patients each month. "We average 25 new patients a week that are calling for service, so you can imagine how long the wait list is," she said. A striking number of those calls are coming from working people. "We are seeing rising numbers of working people, people who are working for a company that does offer group insurance," Bradley said. "But the cost that's being passed on to them makes it not an option."

According to the Johnson Foundation report, 88 percent of Virginia employers offered health insurance in 2005, down from about 91 percent from 2001. And of the 150,000 patients seen by free clinics in the state, 70 percent have full-time jobs, Markwith said. And 13 percent are working part time. "These are people who are working, and they still cannot afford health insurance," he said. People like Perry Forrest, who leaves on Sunday evenings for his job with the electric company in southern Maryland and returns Thursdays. He and his wife have been patients at the Gloucester-Mathews clinic for about a year.They figure that they'll stay with the clinic for now, rather than pay the weekly premium needed to buy health insurance from his employer.

news source : http://www.redorbit.com/

Healthnet insurance

Healthnet Services is an independent broker specialising in the private medical insurance market and also other protection products such as life, critical illness and income protection, meaning you have all your protection needs covered in one place.

We have a dedicated team of insurance consultants who will search the market for you and who use our unique comparison tools to ensure that we find the most suitable plans at the most competitive premiums. We deal with individual plans through to corporate and expatriate cover and always ensure a friendly and helpful service.

As an independent broker we deal with the whole of the insurance market place. We provide all our clients with a full market review and we draw the information from around 40 providers with in excess of 222 different plans. Because we are specialists in the area of protection we then narrow the choices down to three suitable plans for you making the complicated choices easier to manage and save you time trawling through the providers.

We offer this as a free no obligation service which guides you through what your requirements are, we then work on your behalf to find the best package to suit your individual needs and requirements and if you have any questions we are on standby to guide and advise you whichever way you choose.

news source : http://www.myfinances.co.uk/

Insurance costs pressure smokers

The idea of making cigarette smokers pay extra for their health insurance is catching on with employers and spurring debates about worker freedom, but one key question remains in doubt: Do such incentives really work to reduce smoking? So far the answer appears to be yes, say health insurers and companies that have tried the tactic.

Most such programs charge smokers $20 to $100 extra for health insurance each month, but drop the fee for anyone who enters a smoking cessation program. That economic lure tends to double enrollment in cessation programs, said Sean Bell, a senior vice president at Free & Clear, a Seattle-based company that designs tobacco treatment plans. "If people enroll in the program, they're more likely to quit than if they do nothing," Bell said.

news source : http://www.chicagotribune.com/

Healthcare industry, foundation offer reform plans

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group representing health plans and hospitals proposed health insurance reforms that would revise payment systems on Tuesday, clashing with a respected private foundation that proposed much more extensive reforms.

The idea from Commonwealth Fund, published in the May/June issue of the journal Health Affairs, calls for all companies to be required to help fund health insurance in the United States and for the establishment of a government entity to sell low-priced plans to small businesses and individuals, as part of a plan to dramatically shrink the rolls of the uninsured.

That plan met with opposition from the industry group, underscoring the difficulty in any attempt at reforming the health care system. "The U.S. is the only industrialized country that doesn't cover everyone," Commonwealth Fund president Karen Davis said, in previewing her plan in a press briefing on Monday. Her goal is influence the debate over health reform, seeing an opportunity for change when a new president takes office in 2009.

Escalating costs and limited access to quality medical care in the U.S. are among the top domestic health issues cited by voters in national polls ahead of the November election. The Commonwealth plan would build on the current employer-based system, which finances health care for about 160 million Americans. The number of people without medical insurance in the United States is now estimated at 47 million, or about 15 percent of the U.S. population.

news source : http://uk.reuters.com/

Japan Opposition Wants Medical Insurance Law Scrapped, NHK Says

May 11 (Bloomberg) -- Japanese opposition parties will submit a bill later this month to abolish a new medical insurance law targeting people aged 75 years and older, an opposition party politician said in a NHK program.

The new medical insurance system, which raised net premium payments for many seniors because of changes to subsidies, became effective in April.

``The bad law should be abolished,'' Kenji Yamaoka a Diet committee chairman of the Democratic Party of Japan said on the program today. Four opposition parties will submit a bill to the Upper House in the last week of May, he said.

news source : http://www.bloomberg.com/

Health coverage heading to flash point

The number of uninsured Virginians is climbing while medical coverage through the workplace is declining. Politicians are beginning to take notice. More than 1 million Virginians lack health insurance, studies find, and the percentage of Virginians getting health-care coverage through their employers dropped from a high of 70 percent in 1979 to 57 percent in the intervening 26 years. Virginians fare worse on work-basedinsurance than the Census Bureau's national average of 60.2 percent.

"We're clearly reaching the point when there's going to be something new in the medical area," said James Ceaser, a professor of politics at the University of Virginia. "All three [presidential] candidates have different proposals . . . something's going to happen," he said. In Virginia, the governor and some lawmakers tried to address the problem this year with a bill to create a VirginiaShare HealthInsurance Program. The legislation, which would have helped low-income working people by paying one-third of their health-insurance premiums, passed the Senate but died in a House of Delegates committee. It would have paid for insurance provided through small employers that are finding it more difficult to provide workers with medical coverage.

"Money is tight for any small business," said Lisa Stanfield, an executive vice president at Barber Martin Advertising in Richmond. "We've always wanted to have richer, better benefits than our competitors when we're hiring people," Stanfield said. But a small businesses, trying to provide good raises, cannot boost wages enough to offset health-insurance premium increases of 12 percent to 15 percent, she said. Her company gets forced into changing health-care carriers a lot, because insurance companies will underbid the existing carrier to win the business, Stanfield said. "Employees [who have to learn the new health plan] hate that," she said. In some cases, smaller employers are ending coverage.

The number of Virginians without medical insurance coverage increased since 2001 from 10 percent to more than 13 percent in 2006, or a million people. That occurred despite favorable economic conditions, the Commonwealth Institute, which released wage and benefits studies on Virginians before this year's General Assembly session, found. The Virginia figure is less than the 15.8 percent of uninsured Americans the Census Bureau determined in 2006, which equated to 47 million people. For the low-income self-employed, obtaining health insurance can be an insurmountable problem. Take Earl Hampton, a 64-year-old handyman who lives near Charlottesville.

The former naval architect for a defense contractor in Northern Virginia moved with his wife to the Afton area of Albemarle County to open a bed and breakfast in the late 1990s. With the move, the family income dropped from roughly $100,000 a year to $35,000. After the Sept. 11 attacks slammed the tourism business, they sold their B&B and moved to Greene County. His wife works as a business manager at a used-car lot and has no healthinsurance. He picks up maintenance work when he can. The Hamptons -- she has high blood pressure and he Type-2 diabetes -- have no medical insurance and lack the means to afford it. Hampton believes that more and more people will be doing in the future what he is doing now. "I take my echinacea and go to the free clinic."

news source : http://www.inrich.com/

Beat the High Cost of Health Insurance

(ARA) - If you've shopped for or are currently paying for health insurance, you know that consumers are paying more than ever before for their policies. But the numbers are staggering. According to Families USA, workers' costs for health insurance rose 36 percent between 2000 and 2004 while the average workers' increase in earnings rose just 12.4 percent. The number of Americans spending more than a quarter of their income on medical costs climbed from 11.6 million in 2000 to 14.3 million in 2004, according to the group. No wonder nearly 50 percent of Americans surveyed recently said they are very worried about having to pay more for their health care or healthinsurance, while 42 percent report they are very worried about not being able to afford health care services.

"Politicians and pundits can debate the reasons for the high cost of health insurance in the United States, but the bottom line for most of us is simply whether we can afford the health insurance that we need to protect our families in case of injury or illness," says Chini Krishnan, CEO of Vimo, an online company that helps consumers find affordable healthinsurance. The sad fact is that even individuals who have access to health insurance through their employer often can't afford their share of the premium cost. According to the National Coalition on Health Care, the annual premium for an employer health plan covering a family of four averaged nearly $11,000 in 2005 while the annual premium for single coverage averaged over $4,000. Employers passed much of that cost on to employees.

The good news is that it is possible to find affordable health insurance. Thanks to the Internet, finding the best deal for you and your family takes just a few minutes. Sites like vimo.com allow individuals and small companies to comparison shop for health plans with the click of a mouse. Just visit the site and provide some basic information, and the site provides you with instant quotes from top rated companies and connects you with localinsurance brokers who offer policies that fit your needs at the price you can afford. Health savings accounts (HSAs) are also helping make health insurance more affordable. Employers and individuals can make contributions to health savings accounts tax-free. The money may then be used tax-free to pay for qualified medical expenses. If you don't use all the money in your HSA in any given year, it can be rolled over to the next year.

news source : http://www.bradfordera.com/

Groups Rally for Insurance Coverage

CHARLESTON -- The issue of providing health coverage for the uninsured brought together some politically strange bedfellows recently for a rally at the state Capitol that its organizers hope will be a stepping stone for health care reform. Only a few dozen people showed up for the May 3 rally, most wearing bright yellow shirts, but the list of sponsors for the event was impressive. Among them were the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce and the West Virginia AFL-CIO, two organizations that usually take opposite sides on many business issues. Other groups included advocacy organizations such as West Virginians for Affordable Health Care, Mountain State Blue Cross Blue Shield, the state's largest health insurer, and religious groups such as the Charleston Black Ministerial Alliance.

All the groups came together to recognize "Cover the Uninsured Week," with organizers saying that in West Virginia, 245,000 people went uninsured for the entire year of 2006 -- or about 14 percent of its population. "One of the best phrases I ever heard was 'The nation's budget is its morality walking,'" said Delegate Don Perdue, D-Wayne, chairman of the House Health and Human Resources Committee. "Having said that, we know we need to contribute more." The rally was organized by Perry Bryant of West Virginians for Affordable Health Care. He said it took months of planning and was sponsored by more than 20 organizations. He hopes the coalition created for the rally will continue to work for health care reform in the future, although he acknowledged that some members have conflicting agendas. "People have to bring to the table a willingness to put aside some preconceived ideas about where people are going to be," he said. "I think it is important for us all to deal with each other in a straightforward, civil manner."

One of the first things the coalition is working on is a project with the West Virginia Health Care Authority to create an actuarial model so it can get figures for various health care reform options, Bryant said. Organizers used the rally to pass out figures of their own they said demonstrated the extent of the uninsured problem in the state and nation:

* About four West Virginians die every week because they lack health insurance, while as many as 18,000 Americans die every year because they are uninsured.

* Fewer employers are offering health insurance to employees because of its high cost. The percentage of firms offering health insurance dropped from 69 percent to 60 percent from 2000 to 2006.

* The West Virginia Health Care Authority found that in 2006, state hospitals provided $578 million in uncompensated health care, most of which was provided to the uninsured.

* Most uninsured -- eight out of 10 people -- come from working families.

* An estimated 28 percent of all personal bankruptcies filed in the United States are the direct result of illness or injury.

Those organizations that participated in the rally brought with them their own ideas about how to tackle health care reform. Kenneth Perdue, president of the West Virginia AFL-CIO, pointed to figures recently released by his organization showing an increase in the number of occupational deaths. A lot of workers are not being given the option to say they don't want to enter unsafe workplaces, he said. "It is happening more in insurance because workers are being told they are not going to have insurance," he said. Just as workers should have the right to say no to entering unsafe workplaces, "we want workers to have the right to have healthinsurance."

news source : http://www.statejournal.com/

What would Hillary Clinton do to our country as president?

We have pondered about Barack Obama as president but as events unfold and Hillary seems to be getting the upper hand for the Democrat presidential nomination, we need to reexamine what this "smartest woman in the world" would do to our country. Carl Bernstein had it right when he wrote this about a Hillary Clinton presidency: "What will a Hillary Clinton presidency look like? The answer by now seems obvious: It will look like her presidential campaign, which in turn looks increasingly like the first Clinton presidency. Which is to say, high-minded ideals, lowered execution, half truths, outright lies (and imaginary flights), take-no prisoners politics, some very good policy ideas, a presidential spouse given to wallowing in anger and self-pity, and a succession of aides and surrogates pushed under the bus when things don't go right. Which is to say, often. And endless psychodrama: the essential Clintonian experience that mesmerizes the press, confuses the citizenry, confounds members of both parties in Congress (not to mention the Clintons themselves, at times) and pretty much keeps the rest of the world constantly amused and fixated."

There is a reason why so many people have a negative view of the former "First Lady"; for one, she is a shrill-voiced near communist espousing ultra-liberal policies with the character deficiencies well described by Bernstein. Representative of Hillary's ideas of authoritarian government control is her universal health insurance plan, disguised as "universal healthcare"; which would provide poor quality cradle-to-the-grave medical care for everyone. Gone would be the individual right to work with their physician to select most appropriate medical treatment, gone would be the ability to have a medical insurance program according to one's budget, gone would be the need for employers to provide competitive health insurance to their employers and, worst of all, gone would be doctor's incentives to provide their patients the best healthcare possible. If the Hillary program was made law, replacing all these lost rights would be a government program giving bureaucrats control over who lives or dies.

The fine print in the Hillary healthcare proposal is also interesting, and it's always important to read the fine print. According to the latest "Hillarycare" program the government would have a great deal to say about your health care. In addition to requiring you by law to buy health insurance coverage, many employers would be required by law to either provide coverage or pay a tax to cover health expenses. States would be "relieved" of the burden of regulating health insurance markets. Healthcare costs in the United States are high but no higher than in the countries with socialized medicine. High costs can be addressed by reducing unnecessary spending so workers' taxes may be reduced leaving them more money to pay for medical needs and by making health insurance companies more competitive by opening up the whole country to insurance companies to offer their products. The free market is still the best way to keep costs down.

Although all Democrats never saw a tax increase they didn't like, Hillary is quite clear that she would make sure that the "wealthy", defined as virtually anyone earning $75,000 to $100,000 a year, will have to share their wealth with those "less fortunate". Americans would see the Bush tax cuts evaporate and in their place would be an even more socialized tax structure than we have; "from all according to their means to all according to their needs." Businesses deemed to be "earning too much" would have the government intercede to correct the imbalance. Hillary, like all Democrats, refuses to acknowledge that any added costs placed on business ultimately are paid for by their customers. Even proposals to tax "excess profits" are feel-good programs that will add to the cost of gasoline and other petroleum products and do not lead to lower costs. Although additional income to the government gives Democrats more income to redistribute, the burden is on the public not the oil companies.

Senator Hillary Clinton recently introduced a proposal for a new $10 billion federal program to offer government-subsidized preschool for all children across the country. Under her plan, states that offer such programs would be eligible to receive federal funding if they agree to follow federal guidelines on matters such as teacher training requirements and curriculum guidelines. This is an overt attempt to have the federal government dictate what should or should not be taught to your children. In keeping with the Clintons' history of opposing school-choice initiatives, Hillary Clinton has attacked school vouchers which could be used by parents to escape the inefficiencies of public education and avoid politically correct indoctrination.

As an advocate of expanded public housing, Hillary Clinton will out do her Democrat predecessors. If she has her way, Hillary Public housing may be coming to your neighborhood. Hillary Clinton is leading a movement to spend billions of tax dollars to buy homes in foreclosure and convert them to public housing. Do you have houses in foreclosure near you; if so you may find yourself in a public housing neighborhood?

news source : http://www.rightsidenews.com/

Korean Life Insurance industry outlook stable - Moody's

MUMBAI (Thomson Financial) - Moody's Investors Service sees a stable outlook for the Korean life insurance industry, reflecting expectations for the sector's fundamental credit conditions over the next 12 to 18 months. The stable outlook is based on the likelihood of abundant growth opportunities thanks to deregulation, favorable socio and economic trends, improving asset quality and capital adequacy, Moody's said. The stable outlook is further based on its view that of 'a rather gentle decoupling of the Korean economy' from the U.S. through the rise of intra-regional trade, especially with China since the last U.S. recession in 2001, Moody's. Therefore, Korean economic growth should be able to continue to support premium growth of the life industry, the ratings agency said.

An aging population, greater consumer awareness of investments, familiarity with capital markets, and a positive economic outlook boosting savings are factors which support strong growth within the sector, the report noted, adding that M&A activity will likely pick up as banks and foreigninsurance groups look for investment opportunities for cross-selling, expansion and diversification. The anticipated public listing of life insurers on the Korea Exchange will provide a new source of funding, Moody's noted.

news source : http://www.forbes.com/

LIC slaped Rs 5 lakh for mental agony

The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum awarded claim of Rs five lakh along with interest at the rate of nine per cent per annum from the date of repudiation on June 28, 2007 against Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) to a widow Raj Rani of Sangrur. Ved Parkash Aggarwal, the husband of widow obtained Insurance policy on March 28, 2006 for Rs 5 lakh responding to proposal of agent of LIC.

The LIC yesterday also slapped by Forum comprised President M D Sharma and Member H L Sharma to pay Rs 5,000 on account of mental pain, agony and harassment, besides a sum of Rs 1,000 as litigation expenses. The husband of widow died on June 21, 2006 due to septic shock within a period of two months and 20 days of taking of the LIC policy, but the LIC repudiated claim vide letter dated June 28, 2007. The LIC contended concealment of facts by deceased claiming that he was not suffering from any disease while signing the papers.

It was also alleged that he didn't took any treatment from any doctor about ailment as mentioned in proposal form. The LIC claimed that during course of investigation it came to light that the deceased was suffering at end stage of renal deceased since December 2005 besides hypertension for the last six years. It was averred that during course of investigation the LIC found that the deceased was a chronic alcoholic for last 15 years and was afflicted with diabetes mellitus for 13 years and had also a past history of jaundice in 1973.

news source : http://www.business-standard.com/