Pulaski County may be sticking with its current health insurance company for a while longer, as more research is done about a potential switch. County officials decided to revisit insurance options this year, with the hope of finding some cost savings.
The county got proposals from four insurance companies last week, including the current provider, Bennett and Shepherd. The county commissioners had planned to hire a consultant Monday to review them, so they could pick one on July 1.
Trish Whitcomb with Bondry Management Consultants told the commissioners Monday that her company could do that for about $5,000, but they’d like to do a more in-depth study. “You have all the information from them,” she said. “We can go through that with you. We can model some stuff. We’ll look at the information that you have internally, to look at the brokers, whose proposals that you already have, most closely reflect what your claims history shows, what your goals – you see, I don’t even know what your goals are for your health care.”
Whitcomb said Bondry could work with county officials to determine how much work needs to be done and negotiate a not-to-exceed contract. She said that could end up being a better overall value.
Whitcomb noted that the county issued a comprehensive request for proposals, but she felt the RFP process isn’t the best way to choose an insurance company. “When you’re dealing with something like an insurance broker, who’s going to be representing you with a lot of different firms who all have their own way of doing things, the RFP is very restrictive, and it doesn’t allow for enough creativity that you might need,” she explained. “And it creates a liability because if you receive RFPs from a number of firms, any one of the firms who don’t win can challenge you.”
She said the county could eliminate its liability by deciding not to make a selection at this time from the submissions, but the county could still use the information as part of its research process.
But Auditor Laura Wheeler pointed out that would be hard to do by July 1, which is when open enrollment starts, especially since any insurance change would need funding approval from the county council. In the end, the commissioners decided to table the matter for further discussion, with the understanding that the county could stay with Bennett and Shepherd until they finish reviewing the options.
