It’s (Summer) Time for Wellness Plan Re-Design

Now that summer is here, there are only a few more months until benefit plan open enrollment for 2019 gets underway. Employers who maintain a wellness program that includes biometric testing, health risk assessments (HRAs), or medical questionnaires need to think now about how they will design their plan in the new year, as changes to the rules governing these wellness features go into effect.  This post outlines the changes and discusses the new design landscape for 2019.

What are the Changes?

During 2017 and 2018, final regulations under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) limit the financial incentive employers may offer in exchange for participating in biometric testing, HRAs or medical questionnaires, to an amount equal to 30% of the cost of individual coverage (both the employee and employer portions.) The same limit applies to surcharges or penalties for not taking part.  Companion regulations under Title II of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) apply the same cap to completion of an HRA or medical questionnaire by an employee’s spouse, because manifestation of a disease or disorder in a family member comprises genetic information on the employee.  The ADA regulations also disallow the 20% additional incentive tied to tobacco use, if the wellness program includes a blood test for nicotine or cotinine.  The ADA and Title II of GINA apply to employers with 15 or more employees.   We discussed the ADA and GINA rules in a prior post.

The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) challenged the 30% incentive limit in court on the grounds that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) failed to prove that this cap was necessary in order for participation in the biometric testing or health risk assessment (HRA) to be “voluntary” and not coercive, which is an ADA requirement.

A federal court agreed with the AARP, and vacated the 30% incentive cap effective January 1, 2019.  (Other provisions of the ADA regulations, including notification and confidentiality rules, remain in effect.)  The court also lifted a requirement that the EEOC publish new proposed regulations on the voluntary standard by August 31, 2018.   The EEOC may issue regulations in the future (and could appeal the court decision), but wellness program design for 2019 must get underway in the absence of clear guidance on the voluntariness standard.

2019 Design Landscape

The chart below illustrates the wellness rule landscape effective January 1, 2019 for employers that are subject to the ADA. Wellness regulations under HIPAA and the ACA will continue to apply, but they do not impose any limit on incentives (or penalties) for biometric testing or HRAs that are “participation only” i.e., that do not require physical activity, or specific health outcomes.

Despite the vacated EEOC standard, employers should exercise caution in setting financial incentives for biometric testing, HRAs or medical questionnaires.  Even prior to issuing regulations, the EEOC had challenged wellness programs in several court actions, ranging from a program that conditioned biometric testing and completion of an HRA on a $20 per paycheck surcharge, to one that conditioned 100% of the premium cost on taking part in an HRA. Although the cases generally were resolved in favor of the employer, they make clear that EEOC may view even modest incentives as failing the voluntary standard.

Employers should also make sure that their wellness program follows up after gathering health data through biometric testing, HRAs or medical questionnaires, with information, advice, or programs targeted at health risks.  A wellness program that fails to do so would not qualify as an employee health program under the ADA and the voluntary wellness program exceptions would not be available.

So what are some options for 2019? There are several design “safe harbors” that do not trigger the ADA voluntariness standard:

1) Eliminating biometric testing/HRAs/medical questionnaires altogether.

2) Keeping biometric testing/HRAs/medical questionnaires, but removing any financial incentive or penalty that applied to them.

3) Offering smoking cessation programs that request self-disclosure as a tobacco user (no blood test for nicotine, cotinine).

Limiting financial incentives/penalties for biometric testing/HRAs/medical questionnaires to an amount that does not exceed 10 – 15% of the individual premium is another option. This range is just high enough to encourage participation, but it is under 20%.  In AARP v. EEOC, the court’s August 2017 ruling on summary judgment cited a RAND study noting that “high powered” incentives of 20% or more may place a disproportionate burden on lower-paid employees.

What about different incentive levels for different groups of employees? First, this may be administratively impractical, and second, it might run afoul of the HIPAA/ACA requirement that the full wellness incentive or reward be made available to all “similarly situated” individuals.  Groupings of employees for this purpose must be based on bona fide, employment-based classifications that are consistent with the employer’s usual business practice, such as between full-time and part-time employees, hourly and salaried, different lengths of employment, or different geographic locations.   For many employers, these criteria may not always neatly overlap with different compensation levels.

In sum, employers who do not wish to eliminate biometric testing and HRAs/medical questionnaires from their wellness programs should anticipate living with some uncertainty about whether their financial incentives meet ADA standards.   Engaging in careful planning in the coming weeks, together with benefit advisors and legal counsel, can help keep the risk to a minimum.