Employees: We’ll pay for weight loss help
August 6, 2009 by Bill MeltzerPosted in: Health care, Latest News & Views, Pay and benefits
Looking for incentives to get overweight employees to buy into a wellness program?
A recent study suggests many employees are even willing to pay much – or all – of the cost themselves. Roughly 35% of firms with wellness programs focus on providing workers with convenient access to weight loss resources.
A poll of 1,352 employees by the Strategies to Overcome and Prevent Obesity Alliance found that many people would gladly chip in for the cost of the program if they believed it would help them lose weight. What employees want:
- confidential support and counseling
- access to a professional nutritionist or personal trainer, and
- onsite exercise programs.
Until recently, only big companies were able offer such programs as part of their wellness benefits. But the fastest growth of these programs in the last two years has been in smaller firms (sometimes with as few as 50 full-time employees).
The majority of firms split the cost with employees. Typically, workers pay up to about 25% of the cost. But some plans are fully employee paid.
Tags: Health care, health costs, wellness programs
August 11th, 2009 at 9:03 am
Healthy employees increase business productivity so both employers and employees have something to win from here.
August 12th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
You should invite Dr Huinzinger (developer of biggest losser & Prof of
edicine at UCLA to come help you
August 13th, 2009 at 10:08 am
We have a well established Wellness Program and have made strides but find it difficult to get the ones who need it the most to participate.
August 13th, 2009 at 11:44 am
Interesting point about desire for confidential support and access to professional nutritionist. This sort of counseling is now being offered online through several websites and can be delivered less expensively than having an in-house nutritionist. I admit that I have a personal bias (our company offers such services online) but I think that we will see more companies trying out online solutions that connect individuals to qualified counselors.
August 13th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
We have a great wellness program for employees who carry our insurance and those who don’t. We offer a Wellness Allowance of up to $500 for employees that go get their annual physical exams from their doctors. With the allowance they can do a weight maintenance program (Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers), Nutritionist, Gym Membership, Therapuetic Massage for stress management, Smoking Cessation programs, Fitness Boot Camps, all mainstream things. We give them a verification letter where no confidential information is to be exchanged, just the doctor/nurse signing off that the person had their check up. Part 2 of that incentive is the employees who go get their physical exams, pay less in their share of the insurance premium than those who don’t get their annual exams. If the employee has a spouse covered under the insurance, then, the spouse must also get their physical exam before they can become eligible for wellness program. We don’t count children because they generally have to have exams and immunizations just about every year. This our first year with this Wellness program and it went over way better than we expected. Out of 140 people only 16 haven’t had their exams yet. One more thing, the HSA Insurance we carry gives people incentive to fill out Health Questionaires ($50) Gift Card for online vendors. If you have a qualified health condition (diabetes, Hypertension, High Cholestrerol etc) you can sign up for Health Coaching program which they give you $100 gift card for and when you graduate from the program, you get a $200 Gift Card. Don’t know anyone who has done the health coaching but most HSA participants have already done the health questionaire.
August 18th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
I think corporate wellness programs are great, as long as accurate information about nutrition and exercise is being distributed. It can be difficult to change your lifestyle if others around you are not trying to do the same or aren’t being supportive, but when your co-workers (who you tend to spend a lot of your time with) have the same goals as you do, it becomes a lot easier.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:13 am
If companies provided flexible hours, it would provide incentives for employees to get more physically active. All these programs sound great but without time to participate, none of them work.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:21 am
Our program is working out great because the Health Insurance Company we use, provides the employees with plenty of incentive and information which I reinforce it by e-mailing or posting, or attaching to paychecks. Ultimately, it’s up to the employee. We still have plenty of people who don’t take advantage of free money just for getting their 100% Expense Paid Annual Physical Exam, smoke and don’t plan on quitting, eat extremely unhealthy, and are overweight. It still always comes down to a matter of personal choice on the employees part but at least the company has tried to provide a way to keep employees healthy or have them find out about life threatening health conditions they may not know they have.