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Small Businesses
Blue PrioritySM HRA
Looking to manage costs and give your employees more responsibility for their health care choices?
Blue Priority HRA is a tax-advantaged benefit that can help you balance your small business's short- and long-term
health care expenses and encourage your employees to make smarter health decisions.
How It Works
Blue Priority HRA consists of a high-deductible PPO health plan coupled with a health reimbursement account (HRA)
to help employees pay for eligible medical expenses not covered by the health plan. You make an annual amount of money
available to employees through the HRA, and fund the account only as employees incur eligible expenses. You control
how employees access their HRA funds and what expenses qualify for reimbursement, which means you can opt to cover copays,
deductible and coinsurance amounts — even vision expenses and over-the-counter drugs. All contributions to the HRA
are tax-deductible, and tax-free for employees.
With Blue Priority HRA, employees have greater responsibility for their
health care decisions; they choose where and when to spend their health care dollars
based on how you design the account. If medical expenses exceed the amount in the HRA, the employee pays the difference
until the health plan coverage takes over. Any unused HRA funds are carried over, and can grow in value as long as the
employee remains in the plan. By providing employees more control, they become smarter health care consumers and
engage in behaviors that help reduce health care costs. You keep any HRA balances if an employee leaves the company.
Key Selling Points
- Lower cost health plan alternative. A high-deductible PPO health plan is paired with a health reimbursement account (HRA) to help employees pay for eligible medical expenses not covered by the health plan.
- Encourages health care consumerism. Employees can decide how to spend their health care dollars, based on what expenses qualify for reimbursement – an incentive
to use health care wisely.
- Tax advantages for employers and employees. All contributions to the HRA
are tax-deductible, and tax-free for employees. Unused Blue Priority HRA dollars
remain in the account from year-to-year and can grow in value over time.
- Network strength. With 99 percent of South Dakota physicians
and 98 percent of the state’s hospitals participating in the Blue
Select network, employees won’t have any trouble finding a network provider
or facility. And employees see the doctors and specialist they choose – no referrals are needed.
- Coverage anywhere via BlueCard. If employees need care away
from home, they're covered by the Blue Card network, with more than 6,000
hospitals and 635,000 doctors worldwide.
* State tax treatment may vary
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