Processing of retiree health insurance payments: In 2020, Peter Kuriloff was repeatedly experiencing difficulties with the processing of his personal retiree health insurance payments. After Peter contacted Kathleen Hall Jamieson in her role as faculty senate chair, Jamieson added him to the Faculty and the Administration (SCOA) Committee as an ex officio member. There Peter, Marshall Meyer, PASEF’s SCOA representative, and the late Joel Bennett looked into the outsourcing of benefits administration. With the support of PASEF, Peter, Marshall, and Joel surveyed retiring and retired faculty on their experiences with WageWorks and Health Advocate. Eight hundred and twenty-five faculty members were surveyed and 245 (or 30%) responded. Their report, circulated to the faculty via Almanac and shared with Human Resources, showed that a substantial group of responding faculty had significant issues with WageWorks.
In response to the survey results, Human Resources moved the processing of retiree health insurance payments from Health Equity/WageWorks to BRI Cobra with effect from October 2022. The transition went smoothly, and we have not heard complaints about the handling of these payments since.