In Texas, public school districts are eligible to purchase their group health insurance coverage through the Teacher Retirement System. Most Texas school districts have elected to do so. Rates, for all practical purposes, have remained static over the past 4 years, with the Economies of Scale providing a safe harbor for many.
Yet, we find that there are still some Texas school districts that have elected not to join the TRS ActiveCare program. It seems that these disticts are paying more by not joining the TRS plan. We are wondering why. Could it be that there are no commissions to be paid to brokers, who in turn are unable to secure school board votes with “campaign contributions.?” It seems to us that if you can get the same or better coverage through the TRS ActiveCare plan and save a substantial amount of taxpayer money, it would be a prudent business practice to join the TRS plan.
Editor’s Note: The TRS Active Care program is self funded, as opposed to a partially self-funded plan (TRS plan has no stop loss insurance cover).
2008 Audit Report shows $1.1 billion in revenue, $953 million in paid claims. Ratio of total operating expense to revenue is 96.3%. Booked reserves are $476 million. Based on this, we expect little or no increase needed to fund expenses and liabilities through 2009. Plan expenses are low due to lack of stop loss, agent commissions, marketing fees, etc.
For more information on TRS ActiveCare, click here – http://www.trs.state.tx.us/
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