On Feb. 1, the Grand Blanc Community School District, 10 miles south of Flynt, Mich., saw the future of healthcare, not fully formed, but the outline was there to behold. On that momentous day, 25 Grand Blanc school administrators shifted from the old managed care system to new health savings accounts (HSAs). Where they once struggled with co-pays and deductibles and referrals and precertified service, they now had only one thing to worry about–a $1,200 upfront deductible for singles or $2,500 if an administrator had a spouse or children. The district pays the deductible for the administrators. After the administrator uses up the deductible, then the insurance–on which premiums run signi-
ficantly less–would kick in at 100%. "If you don't use all that money, it's yours," says Dana Taylor, director of business affairs for the Grand Blanc Community School District. "That's the savings account. As long as you spend it only on medical costs, it's never taxable and you can keep it for your retirement."
HSAs–a system somewhat dependent upon the chimera of a well-informed and responsible healthcare consumer–have been around since 2003. What makes the Grand Blanc plan unique rests primarly with the providers–and the Web-based support network that is expected to make effective consumer-directed healthcare less of an unattainable goal.
The Grand Blanc school plan comes out of a seven-month partnership between a LaSalle Bank healthcare company and ConnectYourCare (CYC), a healthcare innovator created in 2002 by Jamie Spriggs, the current president and CEO. In July 2005, Baltimore-based Revolution Health Group became a major investor.
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The partnership between LaSalle and CYC was named LaSalle CDH Solution and offers a full-service, customizable platform to employers to administer consumer-directed healthcare accounts.
One reason this partnership has resonated with both employees and employers: It's not an insurance company. "Most people say that they don't use their health insurance company's Web site for information, because they believe it's biased toward the company," explains Terry Hunter, CEO of ConnectYourCare. "Banks have a much stronger brand. They're trusted. They're closer to both the employer and employee. So we're saying to the consumers that we can provide neutral information that is more reliable than if they had gone to their health insurance company."
Jay Savan, principal at Towers Perrin, agrees: "I think we'll be seeing more combinations like ConnectYourCare and LaSalle. Account administration of a higher order to support the consumer, plus a household name in finance–they bring a lot to the table."
While LaSalle handles the actual healthcare accounts and related banking services, Connect- YourCare provides a portal for online tax-advantaged account administration. The emphasis is on education. "The most visited area of our Web site is the prescription drug comparison site," says Hunter. "When people are paying for drugs out of their own HSAs, they become very curious about generic alternatives, which can save a huge amount of money. Even something as simple as buying a pill splitter to cut a 40-milligram pill in half, instead of buying two 20-milligram pills, can save you $300 over the course of a year."
LaSalle and ConnectYourCare also work closely with employers, who increasingly see consumer-directed or consumer-driven healthcare as the next wave of corporate benefit plans. "Over 60% of employers said last year that they were researching CDH," says Nav Ranajee, director of health care strategy for LaSalle. "That was the year for getting on the radar. This year they're going to be implementing the programs, and the enrollment period of 2008 will see a big uptick in this new market. The more employees and employers who sign up, the more money a company will save. If you can drive 10% adoption of the HSA, you can reduce your cost by 6%. The key is having an attractive, understandable product."
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