| Health care: 6 steps hotels should take now |
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| Wednesday, 21 April 2010 04:47 | |||||
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Yes, health care reform is now the law of the land in the United States.
Unless Republicans make good on their threat to derail it, the U.S. is
no longer the sole industrialized nation without a universal health care
system. Here are some ideas: 1. Banish panic and politics: Take a page from HR’s playbook when it confronts new laws. If the hotel business is to deal effectively with the health care reality that survives reconciliation in Congress, hotel owners and GMs must direct their management teams to concentrate on the business aspects of the new law and to avoid the temptation to grouse and complain; such negativity will not go over well with your employees. 2. Convene a health care council: Immediately assemble a team that includes your hotel HR director (and corporate HR and employee benefits directors, if you have them), hotel and/or corporate health insurance or group plan broker, your hotel controller and cost accountant. Advisory members, called upon as needed to review plans and offer advice, should include your CFO, your employment lawyer (if your hotel is unionized, the lawyer or other negotiator who participated in your most recent contract negotiations and is familiar with the union health and welfare plans to which you are signatory), and your media relations person. If confidential, strategic matters are to be discussed openly in the council’s meetings. You should strongly consider having your attorney present for these meetings. 3. Communicate with your employees: You want your employees to hear about the new law from you in a nonunion setting. Tell your employees that you are studying the new law and how the hotel can best respond; also, that you will keep them informed and that you value everyone’s input. Designate your HR director as the employees’ point of contact to render input; summarize and relay input to your health care council on a regular basis. If you are operating under a union contract, you will want to consult your employment attorney about the best way to proceed because there are several issues to consider. 4. Put your health care council to work: Your council’s members should gather basic demographic data unique to their areas of expertise: The controller, for example, will have the last 12 months of health care premiums, and the HR director will know how many part-time employees are on payroll—and importantly, how many aren’t currently enrolled in your health care plan. A spreadsheet, available only to decision makers, can then be developed that groups employees by coverage type (single, single plus one, family, etc.; you should not use any personal identifying information such as name or social security number) and calculates the known and projected net costs. All of your current health, life, dental, prescription and related costs should be included. You should also calculate the eventual cost to “pay” (the employer tax, should you choose not to provide health care to eligible employees) versus “play” (by enrolling the employee in a plan), so that you will have a basis for comparing those alternatives. 5. Your council’s operating credo should be “quality” versus “urgency”: The more onerous provisions of the health care legislation, those requiring “pay or play” employer financing, for example, are not scheduled to take effect for several years. Thus your council should take its time to produce a comprehensive, thoughtful “white paper” containing various options, their costs and their likely outcomes. The report’s financial spreadsheet should also be flexible, allowing for a quick recalculation as the hotel’s owners consider potential decisions, or as new financial or strategic imperatives emerge. It is recommended that this report be prepared under your employment attorney’s direction and supervision. 6. Hotels currently offering no health coverage must still do the math: Thanks to lobbying by the hospitality industry and others, the current language of the health care reform package suggests that employers with less than 50 full-time employees will be exempted from the provisions of the “pay or play” mandate. The legislation states, however, that regulators will likely count two part-time employees as one full-time employee for purposes of determining whether employers must “pay or play.” Shorthand: If you employ 100 or more part-timers, you’ll likely be covered. If that’s you, consider interviewing at least three health insurance brokers and request them to present quotations and options using the assumptions contained in the reform legislation, not their “stock” quotes. This will at least provide an estimate of your future cost to “play” that can be compared with the cost to “pay.”
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| Last Updated on Wednesday, 21 April 2010 06:44 |
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