Businesses try tough love on health

WELL WISHES: Cooley Group Human Resources Director Deb Bedrosian with extruder operators Tyrone West, left, and Saroeun Teang. Bedrosian says there is much more awareness of health issues now than in the past. / PBN PHOTO/TRACY JENKINS
WELL WISHES: Cooley Group Human Resources Director Deb Bedrosian with extruder operators Tyrone West, left, and Saroeun Teang. Bedrosian says there is much more awareness of health issues now than in the past. / PBN PHOTO/TRACY JENKINS

Though most would rather dangle a carrot than wield a stick, more businesses are moving toward a tough-love approach to corporate-wellness programs, with employees who don’t participate facing higher health-insurance premiums and other financial penalties.
Financial incentives and noncash prizes have long been a staple of such programs, providing employees a motivation to participate in everything from biometric screenings to walking programs, nutritional seminars and stress-reduction programs.
But nationally, more businesses have begun to move past rewards, taking a hard line with employees who resist efforts to take part in preventive programs. A national survey by Aon Consulting released in March found that 5 percent of companies are using penalties alone, while 16 percent use a combination of incentives and penalties. However, more than half of the companies in the survey said they are planning to make the shift to imposing penalties for nonparticipation.
That trend is reflected among some Rhode Island businesses, said Kim Cormier, director of consumer activation at Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island in Providence.
“We have seen an evolution to where some companies are now including penalties for employees who are nonparticipants,” Cormier said. “As more companies see how beneficial participation in wellness programs is, they are beginning to look at tying those penalties to medical-insurance costs.”
Dr. Peter Salgo, an ICU doctor, author and TV host, who spoke at the recent Worksite Health Awards event sponsored by Blue Cross and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, said he knows of one national company that charges employees who refuse to quit smoking an extra $650 a month for health-insurance coverage.
And CVS Caremark Corp. in Woonsocket sparked a reaction when it announced plans to begin docking employees as much as $600 for failing to get involved in wellness activities. “That ought to be a powerful motivator,” Salgo said. Harry J. Sobel, a senior vice president with E4 Health Inc., a Providence employee-benefits and wellness consultancy, said both incentives and penalties can be valuable components of a larger strategy.
“Incentives and penalties force employees to put some skin in the game,” Sobel said. He added that companies such as CVS, which is using financial levers as part of a long-term plan, take a multidimensional approach to employee behavior. “They are trailblazers and they have taken some heat for it.”
Wellness, which Salgo called the “defining project of our century,” is in effect the moving of health care out of doctor’s offices and into workplaces and other settings. “There are 300 million Americans out there at risk of being sick and they all can’t come to my office tomorrow,” he said. “But a lot of them will go to work.”
Winners of Blue Cross’ Worksite Wellness Awards include Amica Mutual Insurance Co., which recently installed a regulation half-size basketball court at its Lincoln headquarters; Moran Shipping Agencies Inc. in Providence – a Providence Business News Healthiest Employer award winner in 2012 – where novel programs include a sleep-sense workshop and a financial-wellness program; and Advanced Pharmacy Concepts in North Kingstown, where Data Analyst and Wellness Coordinator Peter Mark said wellness efforts were launched in 2010 and almost immediately had participation rates of over 50 percent.
Deb Bedrosian, director of human resources at Cooley Group in Pawtucket, sees the impact the wellness program has made on the composite manufacturer’s 130 employees every day.
Workers, who collectively have walked around the world several times according to pedometer readings, regularly stop by the BMI machine and traditional scale outside Bedrosian’s office. “There is much more awareness of health issues now,” she said.
Cooley has focused on positive incentives – employees can earn Wii Fit consoles by winning in-house competitions – and has been able to at least hold the line on health care cost increases as a result. “We have been very successful the past couple of years at maintaining, if not zero, then very small, single-digit increases,” she said. Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce President Laurie White said the key ingredient to success in wellness programs, even ahead of financial resources, is leadership.
“It has to come from the top in terms of setting the tone,” she said. The Chamber – which has co-sponsored the wellness awards for the past 19 years – has begun its own wellness program for its 15 staffers, with a ShapeUp program and a walking group.
White hopes to expand wellness efforts next year with a focus on nutrition, including the type – and amounts – of food served at the Chamber’s many events each year.
At Hinckley, Allen & Snyder LLP in Providence, Director of Human Resources Megan McCormack said a recurring challenge with wellness programs is “that it needs to be fresh and interesting for everyone.”
Financial incentives have proven to be popular, with 80 percent of the eligible employees participating in the program in order to obtain a 5 percent discount on the share they pay of their health-insurance premiums.
“We don’t really want to make it a penalty,” McCormack said. “It’s really about rewarding good behavior.”
Hinckley, Allen also offers most of its wellness programming during work hours, recognizing that its attorneys and support staff have little free time. One employee has lost more than 125 pounds, and begun to run half-marathons, a health journey that began with a company-funded Weight Watchers at Work program.
Though she admitted it’s difficult to “draw a direct line,” the law firm did see a drop in health insurance premiums in its most recent renewal period. “We have seen our costs start to drop and I’d like to think the wellness program is part of the reason that is happening.” •

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