Insurance rates for group health plans appear to be skyrocketing yet again.
Of the member brokers responding to a new survey about 2011 renewals by the Council of Insurance Agents & Brokers (CIAB), 86% said they are seeing plan premiums increase for small employers (those with 50 or fewer employees) — and most of those increases are falling within the 11% to 20% range.
Mid-size and large employers are also feeling the pain — 58% of mid-size companies (those employing between 51 and 500) are getting hit with rate hikes in the 6% to 15% range.
And 51% of large employers (those with 501 or more employees) are getting hit with increases of at least 6%.
Cost-shifting
Rather than eat those increases by themselves, most employers appear to be changing their plans to pass some of the extra costs on to their workers via higher deductibles, co-pays and premium contributions, according to the CIAB survey.
Is your health plan being hit with similar rate increases? Let us know in the Comments Box below.
