Health care costs to rise for University employees

IU employees will pay more for health care beginning early 2012, said Neil Theobald, the University’s chief financial officer.

He said the increase is due to the University’s health care costs escalating significantly during the last few years.

“Because of the significant increase in the employee contribution, we are going to charge premiums based upon the income of the employee,” Theobald said.

He said the University will cover more health care costs for low-paid employees and less for high-paid employees. The University plans to pay for 90 percent of costs for those on the lower end and 60 percent for those with greater income.

“It’s clearly an issue for employees,” Theobald said. “The importance of the income base was so our lower-paid employees were somewhat sheltered from the cost increase.”

The issue was presented before the Bloomington Faculty Council at its meeting Nov. 1, but details still had to be finalized.

Prior to this, the IU-Purdue University Indianapolis Staff Council met with Theobald to discuss its concerns about the process used to set premiums and the increase in health care costs for University employees.

The group is proposing changes, such as establishing a board of faculty, staff, students and other consultants to work with administrators on the policy.

The proposed changes are likely to be presented before the BFC.

The University Faculty Council is set to establish a Benefits Standards Committee as well, since health care is one of the most costly benefits offered by IU.

“The cost of health care is just going up much faster than we have a way to pay for it,” Theobald said. “It’s an unfortunate situation. The goal here is to manage it as well as possible.”

—Kourtney Liepelt