COBRA and Aging-Out Rules: What Employers Need to Know
By now, most employers know the basics of COBRA — and we’ve already covered the fundamentals in earlier articles. But COBRA has layers, and the deeper you go, the more…
Who Pays for COBRA Coverage and How It Works
We like to write about the “unseen mechanics” behind employee benefits, and COBRA fits that theme perfectly. When employees lose their job or experience another qualifying event, COBRA allows them…
COBRA: What Employers and Employees Need to Know
COBRA can feel like an alphabet-soup acronym until you understand why it exists and how it works. The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) is a federal law that requires…
Understanding IRS Section 501(r): What Employers and Employees Need to Know
Healthcare costs can feel overwhelming for both individuals and employers. Fortunately, there are federal rules designed to ensure fairness in how nonprofit hospitals bill patients and provide financial assistance. One…
Understanding Health Plan Waivers: Validity, Risk, and Participation
Participation levels are often the pain point this time of year. It’s not uncommon to see participation fall well below 50%, setting off alarm bells with fully insured carriers and…
Understanding Waiting Periods in Group Health Plans
One of the most common questions we hear from clients when setting up a health plan is about the waiting period — how long new employees must wait before their…
Driving Tier-1 Utilization: The Key to 2-Tier Plan Savings
We’ve talked before about how 2-tier health plans can effectively control costs through a direct hospital contract (Tier 1) combined with a national network (Tier 2). Ready to explore a…
The Right Ingredients for a 2-Tier Health Plan
The Right Ingredients for a 2-Tier Health Plan You've probably heard us talk about 2-tier health plans—how they can drive down costs through direct hospital partnerships while maintaining broad national…
Big MEC vs. MEC Lean: The Great MEC Showdown
Welcome to the Memberly Café, where we serve up fresh-made health plans every day—hot, compliant, and customized. Today’s special? A side-by-side taste test between two popular menu items: 🍔 Big…
Inside the 2-Tier Health Plan: How Smart Network Design Drives Real Savings
Inside the 2-Tier Health Plan: How Smart Network Design Drives Real Savings You just saved $430,000! That’s what we told our client after their stop-loss was re-rated for a 2-tier…
