SAHU has honored Marcy McCulloch to receive Carrier Executive of the Year award for the second year running. McCulloch is the Small Business Sales Executive for Kaiser Permanente serving Northern California from their Point West office.

“It is an honor to be able to recognize Marcy for her extraordinary performance as a healthcare industry leader for the second year in a row. Especially with health reform driving so much change in our marketplace, Marcy provides invaluable support and education to brokers and their clients. She is relentless in her pursuit of superb customer service, and has been instrumental in elevating the productivity of our Board and association,” said SAHU Immediate Past President, Brad Davis.

“Marcy was nominated and vetted by her peers and the top local leaders in our industry,” said SAHU President, Cerrina Jensen. “There’s really no substitute for the opinion of brokers who again chose Marcy over every other carrier exec nominated.”

Marcy said, “I am ecstatic to be recognized two years in a row for this distinguished award!”

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The Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters (SAHU) is a local chapter of the California Association (CAHU) and the National Association (NAHU). Our vision is that every American will have access to private
sector solutions for health, financial and retirement security, as well as the services of insurance professionals to assist in navigating these areas. SAHU’s mission is to improve our members’ ability to meet the health,
financial and retirement security needs of all Americans through education, advocacy and professional development.

Sac Health Underwriters has named Brad Davis the Association’s 2013 Broker of the Year.

He embodies the best of the health insurance world with compassion and willingness to share his knowledge and experience. “Brad was nominated and vetted by his peers and the top local leaders in our industry,” said SAHU President, Cerrina Jensen. “There’s really no substitute for the opinion of brokers who have worked with – and against – one another in our dynamic marketplace. SAHU’s Broker of the Year award represents significant achievement.”

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The Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters (SAHU) is a local chapter of the California Association (CAHU) and the National Association (NAHU). Our vision is that every American will have access to private sector solutions for health, financial and retirement security, as well as the services of insurance professionals to assist in navigating these areas. SAHU’s mission is to improve our members’ ability to meet the health, financial and retirement security needs of all Americans through education, advocacy and professional development.

Chris Bender, CBC, and VP of Benefits for the Warren G Bender Company, has received Sacramento Health Underwriters’ Legislative Excellence award.

“Chris was nominated and vetted by his peers and the top local leaders in our industry,” said SAHU President, Cerrina Jensen. “SAHU’s Legislative Excellence award represents significant achievement.”

Bender, a resident of Lincoln, has been a leader on the SAHU Board of Directors since 2013. He has served as Legislative Chair at the same time that the Affordable Care Act has been implemented. The Legislative Excellence Award recognizes Chris’s tremendous work as a consumer activist on behalf of his clients, fellow insurance brokers and the Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters.

“I’m excited that we can pay tribute to the leaders in our industry on a local level. Chris has been a key player for our industry in helping to educate legislators about how reform affect business and individual clients” said California Health Underwriters State Legislative VP, Dave Fear, Jr.
Bender responded, “It is a blessing to work with such a fine group of professionals in the Association of Health Underwriters. Being united helps us work toward our goals of effectively educating groups and individuals alike and focus on delivering affordable insurance to all citizens of our great nation.”

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The Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters (SAHU) is a local chapter of the California Association (CAHU) and the National Association (NAHU). Our vision is that every American will have access to private sector solutions for health, financial and retirement security, as well as the services of insurance professionals to assist in navigating these areas. SAHU’s mission is to improve our members’ ability to meet the health, financial and retirement security needs of all Americans through education, advocacy and professional development.

August 11, 2014 – Sacramento CA. A special interest group with substantial support from California Insurance Commissioner, Dave Jones, is sponsoring Proposition 45, an initiative on the November 2014 ballot that gives one politician, currently Dave Jones, a new power over healthcare. If passed, the elected insurance commissioner would have sole authority to set medical insurance rates, co-pays, deductibles and even medical treatment options under health insurance plans in California.

According to Cerrina Jensen, President of the Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters (SAHU), “The overwhelming problem with Proposition 45 is that it appears on the surface to be an appealing and important solution to a real problem. However, in reality it’s a deceptive initiative that causes me great concern – not only as an individual voter, but on behalf of all my clients and their families. The prospect of putting any one elected politician in a position to stand between a patient and their healthcare providers by dictating treatment options and how they’re covered is highly problematic.” Jensen went on to say that “This power grab by special interests puts us all at risk by subjecting us to an alarming intervener provision that would actually incentivize costly and wasteful litigation – exactly what we DON’T need.”

Californians Against Higher Health Care Costs, a coalition of doctors, hospitals, unions, and business groups that oppose Prop 45, says that more rate regulation is just not needed now that we have established an independent commission through Covered California to manage the rate review process. “The Affordable Care Act provides rigorous oversight to negotiate and regulate insurance rates. We are already seeing great results with the recent average 4.5% increase in rates announced by Covered California,” says Carolyn Lewis, Association of Health Underwriters spokesperson.

According to CMS (National Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services), the Affordable Care Act has established an unprecedented level of scrutiny and transparency to health insurance rate increases. The ACA regulations ALREADY help safeguard consumers from unreasonably high rate increases by providing consumers with detailed information on proposed increases and allowing departments of insurance significant power over any rate that increases 10% or more. The new transparency in the health insurance market promotes competition, encourages insurers to do more to control health care costs and discourage insurers from charging rates which are unjustified.

Brad Davis, SAHU Past President says, “Rates are based on numerous factors and actuarial predictions. Having one elected official arbitrarily dictate rates based on what he believes the number should be could set us back decades. Real rate reduction comes from a determined focus on driving the cost of care down through encouraging healthy behaviors, and catching or treating preventable diseases before they become high cost claims. The Affordable Care Act already addresses rate regulation through a “mandated loss” formula as well as incentives toward prevention and healthful accountability.”

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SAHU is the Sacramento chapter of the California and National Associations of Health Underwriters and provides health insurance professionals with advocacy, education and professional development.

uly 31, 2014 – Sacramento CA. Covered California ‘s announcement of a single-digit increase across all carriers in the healthcare exchange marketplace for individuals and families is great news for Californians. According to Brad Davis, CEBS, Immediate Past President for the Sacramento AHU Chapter; “Today’s rate announcement by Covered California is just a small victory in the larger battle at hand. It’s important to remember that the new individual and family health plans have not been in place long enough to give us any good data as to the true cost of the insurance. The good news is that the low premium increase seems to indicate that our health insurance carriers support the “exchange” model and want to continue to do business with Covered California as a distribution channel.”

Cerrina Jensen, Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters’ President, says, “Interestingly, for our Sacramento region, the Anthem Blue Cross HMO rates essentially skyrocketed. As benefits plan specialists, our members would always recommend careful analysis of the basis for these variations before jumping to conclusions.”

The Covered California rate variability exhibits exactly why the Proposition 45 rate regulation initiative on the upcoming ballot would seriously undermine all of the good work that our State has done to lead the way with the ACA. Californians will be hearing much rhetoric regarding medical insurance premium rates in the coming months. Association of Health Underwriters experts across our state agree that rate regulation is already built into the ACA in the form of a medical loss ratio that requires carriers to refund any premium in excess of a certain threshold. Therefore, covered individual and family members are served by the insurance carriers’ best interest that is to keep premiums low. SAHU believes the language in Proposition 45 could actually lead to excessive litigation and unnecessary bottlenecks that will possibly lead to higher premiums and less doctors accepting the plans. A vicious cycle leading to the destruction of Covered California could be the result, and the robust marketplace we have today could be damaged.

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Sacramento, CA. At today’s Covered California Health Exchange press conference Peter Lee, Executive Director, gave full credit to licensed agents along with certified enrollment partners, Covered CA staff and county workers, for the huge success of the 6-month healthcare exchange enrollment process in our state. Certified licensed insurance agents played a key role in helping people pick plans and “cross the finish line” in the final days before the application deadline that had been extended to April 15th. “We are proud of what California has achieved, but recognize this is only the beginning of a long road of expanding affordable coverage to all Californians,” said Lee. Initial statistics show that 39% of the 1.5 Million Californians who signed up for coverage sought help from a Certified Licensed Agent. Only 9% of enrollees got assistance from Certified Enrollment Counselors, and 40% signed up through self-service. Lee stated that the most important lesson learned is that even those who used self-service needed support from trained advisors. In fact, most people said they preferred face-to-face support to guide them through the complicated enrollment process and to explain how medical plans work. According to Brad Davis, President of the Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters, “Agents, are no strangers to health insurance and know that the real work is just beginning. We expect to see a great number of issues arising in the near future over access to providers and prescription coverage as these newly covered consumers begin to utilize their medical benefits.” He went on to say that “it is unfortunate that such a large number of people did not select an agent to represent them through the difficult waters that go beyond the enrollment event.” In any event, says Davis, “this is a great beginning that we should all celebrate as Californians.”

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The Sacramento Association of Health Underwriters (SAHU) is a local chapter of the California Association (CAHU) and the National Association (NAHU). Our vision is that every American will have access to private sector solutions for health, financial and retirement security, as well as the services of insurance professionals to assist in navigating these areas. SAHU’s mission is to improve our members’ ability to meet the health, financial and retirement security needs of all Americans through education, advocacy and professional development.

Photo: Sacramento Brokers recognized today for their part Covered California’s enrollment success.
From Left to Right: Peter Lee, Executive Director, Covered California; Brad Davis, CEBS, Wraith, Scarlett, & Randolph; Susan Duane, Duane Benefits; Cerrina Jensen, Armstrong & Associates; Alex Wiens, Clifford Benefits Group; Carolyn Lewis, MBA, The Lewis Group