R&R Insurance Blog

As an independent insurance agency servicing thousands of fleets, and tens of thousands of families in Southeastern Wisconsin, we know first-hand how life can change in an instant. For 2013, we've put some muscle behind our campaign to help companies and families prevent distracted driving.

R&R Insurance Services has Distracted Driving window clings for corporate fleets wanting to take action and address the issue of distracted driving. Order your Distracted Driving window cling sample and help prevent distracted driving for corporate drivers.

Unfortunately, many accidents occur and lives are lost due to something that can be prevented - Distracted Driving! Let's stay focused behind the wheel and focused towards a common goal to prevent distracted driving.

Request your window cling sample today and help spread the word. We can work together to Stop The Distraction and Save A Life! Window cling samples can only be sent to Wisconsin companies.

Our hearts and prayers go out to the employees and families of Echo Lake Foods, located in Burlington, WI, and we hope that their lives get back to normal as quickly as possible.

It's times like these that make us reflect on the processes and procedures we have in place to make sure that there is minimal loss of property and absolutely no loss of life.

I have compiled an Emergency Preparedness Kit which can help to ensure that my clients and prospects have the knowledge and tools to keep them safe.

Emergency Preparedness involves having a process to prepare for any emergency that may affect the businesses or disrupt normal operations. A procedure should be implemented and tested to become part of the corporate culture by performing drills, providing training for involved personnel and continually evaluating the current plan for necessary changes.

Should you have any questions about fire preparedness, emergency plans or disaster planning, please contact me - I'd be happy to answer your questions, contact Jamie Vanderveldt, Account Executive, Construction Specialist.

If you think medical costs are expensive, that's just the tip of the iceberg when you start to consider the health-related productivity costs....

According to Rutgers University, employee health problems cost employers approximately $226 billion each year. Of these substantial costs, approximately 70 percent resulted from a reduction in productivity, with the rest coming from work absences due to illness. While offering health coverage and benefits for employees and dependents is a major business expense, lost productivity due to physical and emotional health problems can be far more costly for employers.

Lost productivity is classified in two ways: presenteeism and absenteeism. While absenteeism means that the employee is physically not at work, presenteeism is when an employee is physically at work but a physical or mental health condition negatively affects their work quality and quantity. Employers spend two to three dollars on medical-related productivity costs (presenteeism) for every dollar spent on pharmacy and health care costs.

Employers spend two to three dollars on medical-related productivity costs for every dollar spent on pharmacy and health care costs.

The AdvancePCS Center for Work and Health in Hunt Valley, Md. conducted a study of 29,000 employees in the United States to determine how many hours and dollars were spent on lost productivity. The study revealed that 71 percent of lost productivity time was directly related to deficient performance on the job, while only 23 percent was due to actual absences from work. The remaining 6 percent of productivity costs were found to be associated with family health obligations. In addition, smokers who smoke at least one pack per day had productivity losses double that of their nonsmoking counterparts.

Effects of Presenteeism
Presenteeism can have many negative effects on your workforce, including:

• Spending unneeded additional time on tasks
• Decreased quality of work
• Lack of initiative
• Infecting other employees, clients or customers with an illness
• Lowered ability to perform at a high level
• Decreased quantity of work completed
• Inability to be social with co-workers
• Lack of motivation

Causes of Health-Related Productivity Costs

• Back and neck pain (notoriously a very expensive and prevalent medical condition)
• Headaches
• Colds and the flu
• Sinus trouble
• Obesity
• Allergies
• Diabetes
• Depression and/or anxiety
• Ongoing chronic conditions

Decreasing Health-Related Productivity Costs
To reduce productivity costs in your workplace, consider the following:

• Address conditions that affect many individuals of your employee population in your wellness initiatives.
• Offer health fairs, screenings and health risk assessments to evaluate the needs of employees.
• Integrate your health benefit strategies with your health management and wellness initiatives.
• Design your benefits package to support the behaviors that you want to see at your organization.
• Partner with a health care company that takes an innovative approach to wellness and offers productivity, wellness and disease management resources. Your health care company could offer 24/7 nurse line, wellness and health risk assessment tools, lifestyle management and chronic condition assistance, and/or solutions that empower individual employees to take control of their health care.

If you don't address your employees’ health care needs, your workplace is far more likely to experience the negative effects of both absenteeism and presenteeism. However, if you can commit time and funds to help your employees get and stay healthy, you will reduce medical and pharmacy costs and increase worker productivity.

At R&R, we are seeing more and more small businesses in Wisconsin having serious discussions about the link between obesity and workplace injury. On top of that – when you factor in wellness programs that will increase the health and longevity of employees and their families – small businesses can have a lot control over their health insurance costs and the productivity of their employees - control that they don't know they have. At R&R Insurance, we call this program WellCompForLife! Join the WellCompForLife discussion on LinkedIn!

For more information, contact knowledgebroker Stephanie Riesch-Knapp concerning how to execute an effective wellness plan.

This is not intended to be exhaustive nor should any discussion or opinions be construed as professional advice. © 2009-2012 Zywave, Inc. All rights reserved.

Chronic conditions not only deeply affect those who suffer from them, but can also lead to increased medical expenditures and lost productivity for employers. However, in spite of their devastating effects, most chronic conditions are preventable. While some factors such as age, genetics and environmental triggers may be unavoidable, controlling modifiable risk factors such as smoking, physical inactivity and eating an unhealthy diet can play an important part in preventing chronic conditions.

According to the Center for Prevention and Health Services, chronic diseases are health conditions that require ongoing management over an extended period of time. Some chronic conditions have very few symptoms while others severely limit a person’s ability to perform normal, routine tasks. There are many chronic conditions affecting the workforce today, some of the most common being:

• Being Overweight or Obese
• Cancer
• Cardiovascular Disease (coronary artery disease (CAD), stroke, congestive heart failure (CHF) and hypertension)
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) (chronic bronchitis, emphysema or a combination of the two)
• Diabetes

Employer Role in Chronic Condition Management

Approximately 133 million Americans live with the conditions of one or more chronic diseases, which translate into an increased cost for employers. On average, employer healthcare coverage for an employee with a chronic condition is five times higher than coverage for those without a chronic disease. So what can employers do to reduce healthcare costs for themselves and their employees? Think prevention. Treating chronic diseases involves physician visits, extended hospital stays, prescription drugs and expensive treatments. Prevention is the most cost-effective method of reducing chronic diseases among at-risk employees. To assist in prevention efforts, employers should implement workplace policies that encourage employees to use preventive services and health promotion programs. Ultimately, encouraging healthy behavior should be a corporate healthcare strategy to reduce costs. Here are some strategies to prevent chronic conditions within your workforce:

Understand your employee populations:
This way, you can tailor benefits and wellness programs to specific populations based on their current healthcare needs and risk factors.

Encourage usage of clinical preventive services by either covering those benefits in full or with a nominal copayment:
Financial barriers (high co-pays or out-of-pocket expenses) may prevent employees from receiving valuable preventive services, in spite of their significant health benefits. Make preventive services costs more affordable for employees to eliminate this barrier and improve utilization rates among your employee population.

Conduct employee health risk assessments (HRAs):
Conduct an HRA to identify employees who are at risk of chronic diseases. This creates an opportunity to intervene before the disease develops, or at least, during an earlier, less expensive stage of the disease. To encourage employees to take an HRA, offer incentives.

Educate employees about preventive services and benefit coverage:
Develop culturally competent materials to present to employees on preventive services and techniques.

Implement health promotion programs that address the top three causes of chronic conditions (tobacco usage, unhealthy diets and lack of physical activity):

Tobacco Use

• Provide smoking cessation programs as a covered service within your health plan. Cessation benefits cost between $1.20 and $4.80 per employee per year, yet the cost of tobacco use is about $3,400 per smoker per year. By year five, the benefits of smoking cessation programs begin to exceed the costs to implement the programs.
• Implement a smoke-free workplace to discourage smoking and to prevent the harmful effects of secondhand smoke.
• Subsidize smoking cessation aids by negotiating with your pharmacy benefit manager to include smoking cessation assistance as a covered benefit.

Healthy Diets

• Develop incentives for employees to participate in weight reduction programs or nutritional counseling programs. To encourage participation and success, provide rewards.
• Subsidize company cafeterias and vending machines to offer healthy food choices.

Physical Activity

• Develop exercise programs to promote physical activity. Consider providing additional financial incentives such as subsidized gym memberships, financial rewards and on-site fitness facilities to boost participation.

Chronic diseases are serious, costly and most importantly, preventable. Once they are fully developed, these conditions may be managed, yet never cured. Despite this, there are safe, cost-effective interventions to avoid chronic diseases altogether. To avoid productivity loss, presenteeism, absenteeism, disability and early retirement for your employees, you must educate on the value of chronic disease prevention. By implementing a health promotion program and investing in prevention, you can retain a healthy and productive workforce.

At R&R, we are seeing more and more small businesses in Wisconsin having serious discussions about the link between obesity and workplace injury. On top of that – when you factor in wellness programs that will increase the health and longevity of employees and their families – small businesses can have a lot control over their health insurance costs and the productivity of their employees - control that they don't know they have. At R&R Insurance, we call this program WellCompForLife! Join the WellCompForLife discussion on LinkedIn!

Source: Center for Prevention and Health Services, Issue Brief

This information is not intended to be exhaustive nor should any discussion or opinions be construed as legal advice. Readers should contact legal counsel for legal advice. © 2013 Zywave, Inc. – republished from Zywave

(1/23, Nussbaum, Tracer - Bloomberg) reports that in an interview, National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) president Jim Donelon said that "President Barack Obama may need to delay his health-care overhaul or risk 'chaos' when subsidized insurance plans go on sale in October." He explained that "It's unclear how well the federal government or any of the participating states will perform on Oct. 1, when millions of Americans are supposed to begin shopping at online markets created by the law," and that "while the administration has shown no sign of seeking a delay, it may be in the president's best interest." Read full article.

On Jan. 24, 2013, the Department of Labor (DOL) announced that employers will not be held to the March 1, 2013, deadline. They will not have to comply until final regulations are issued and a final effective date is specified.

EXCHANGE NOTICE REQUIREMENTS
In general, the notice must:

• Inform employees about the existence of the Exchange and give a description of the services provided by the Exchange;
• Explain how employees may be eligible for a premium tax credit or a cost-sharing reduction if the employer's plan does not meet certain requirements;
• Inform employees that if they purchase coverage through the Exchange, they may lose any employer contribution toward the cost of employer-provided coverage, and that all or a portion of this employer contribution may be excludable for federal income tax purposes; and
• Include contact information for the Exchange and an explanation of appeal rights.
  This requirement is found in Section 18B of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which was created by the ACA. The DOL has not yet issued a model notice or regulations about the employer notice requirement.

WHEN DO EMPLOYERS HAVE TO COMPLY WITH THE EXCHANGE NOTICE REQUIREMENTS?
Section 18B provides that employer compliance with the notice requirements must be carried out "in accordance with regulations promulgated by the Secretary [of Labor]." Accordingly, the DOL has announced that, until regulations are issued and become applicable, employers are not required to comply with the exchange notice requirements.

The DOL has concluded that the notice requirement will not take effect on March 1, 2013, for several reasons. First, this notice should be coordinated with HHS's educational efforts and IRS guidance on minimum value. Second, the DOL is committed to a smooth implementation process, including:

• Providing employers with sufficient time to comply; and
• Selecting an applicability date that ensures that employees receive the information at a meaningful time.

The DOL expects that the timing for distribution of notices will be the late summer or fall of 2013, which will coordinate with the open enrollment period for Exchanges.

The DOL is considering providing model, generic language that could be used to satisfy the notice requirement. As a compliance alternative, the DOL is also considering allowing employers to satisfy the notice requirement by providing employees with information using the employer coverage template as discussed in the preamble to the Proposed Rule on Medicaid, Children's Health Insurance Programs and Exchanges.

Future guidance on complying with the notice requirement under FLSA section 18B is expected to provide flexibility and adequate time to comply.

"This information is not intended to be exhaustive nor should any discussion or opinions be construed as legal advice. Readers should contact legal counsel for legal advice. © 2013 Zywave, Inc. – republished from Zywave."

The Wisconsin Association of School Boards Insurance Plan (“Plan”) is pleased to announce the establishment of its Endorsed Agent Program. Five insurance agencies specializing in serving the property and casualty and employee benefits insurance needs of Wisconsin school districts and CESAs have been endorsed by the Plan, R&R Insurance Services of Waukesha, WI is one of the agencies for the Property & Casualty insurance Plan.

The endorsed agencies were selected based on their knowledge, depth of resources, and experience in facilitating the provision of insurance and risk management services meeting the special needs of Wisconsin school districts and CESAs, and their willingness to collaborate with the Plan to expand programming in this regard.

Plan Chair and Elk Mound School District Board member Tim Sivertson is enthused about the new program. “These firms have made a commitment to offer Wisconsin school districts and CESAs insurance and programs which meet districts’ ever-changing needs. That’s vitally important as school boards face the challenges presented by reduced budgets and legislative changes.”

“All employees will benefit from the Endorsed Agent Program as the Plan and agencies work together to analyze and communicate ideas which yield the most favorable results for improving health and reducing injuries,” says Nancy Thompson, Plan Trustee, WASB, Inc. Board President and Waterloo School District Board member.

Wisconsin School districts and CESAs are encouraged to contact R&R Insurance for more information.

R&R Insurance Services: Bill Hattendorf
800-566-7007, Ext. 2128, Bill.Hattendorf@rrins.com

Over half of Americans do not carry life insurance. Why is this? Do they not care about the future of the people they are leaving behind? We find this hard to believe. So with 93% of Americans agreeing it's important to have, why are people not carrying adequate protection in the event something would happen?

1. "I haven't had time." Buying a life insurance policy is easy and quick! It's really just determining how much protection you need and how long you'd like the protection. When your surviving spouse walks into our office and is grieving - think of how much peace of mind they will have that you have planned for their future, so they don't have to be scared too.

2. "Too pricey." What are you comparing it to? The big screen TV or the other bills you have? Life insurance isn't a luxury; it's a necessity for the people you care about most and life insurance is affordable.

3. "I have other financial issues to deal with." If you or your partner were to pass away, would the survivor be able to support their current lifestyle? Life insurance should be a priority.

4. "I don't know enough about what to buy." That's what we're here for! We will make it easy and you'll find out the process is not painful.

Wisconsin residents, R&R Insurance wants to make sure that you have sufficient so what you care about most is protected, please contact us.

Texting and driving according to distraction.gov is most distracting because it involves manual, visual, and cognitive distraction simultaneously. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, distracted drivers are responsible for an estimated 25 to 30% of all vehicle collisions which amounts to 1.2 million crashes per year.

At any given moment during daylight hours, over 800,000 vehicles are being driven by someone who is using a hand-held cell phone. Drivers using hand held devices are 4 times more likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. They also are increasing their crash risk 23 times worse than driving while not being distracted.

Sending or receiving a text takes a driver's eyes from the road for an average of 4.6 seconds.  At 55mph it is the equivalent of driving the length of an entire football field, blind.

R&R Insurance offers a free Stop The Distraction Campaign kit for Wisconsin schools and families. Contact us for your free kit!

Texting and driving according to distraction.gov is most distracting because it involves manual, visual, and cognitive distraction simultaneously. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, distracted drivers are responsible for an estimated 25 to 30% of all vehicle collisions which amounts to 1.2 million crashes per year.

At any given moment during daylight hours, over 800,000 vehicles are being driven by someone who is using a hand-held cell phone. Drivers using hand held devices are 4 times more likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. They also are increasing their crash risk 23 times worse than driving while not being distracted.

Sending or receiving a text takes a driver's eyes from the road for an average of 4.6 seconds. At 55mph it is the equivalent of driving the length of an entire football field, blind.

R&R Insurance offers a free Stop The Distraction Campaign kit for Wisconsin schools and families. Contact us for your free kit!