07/13/2007
TABLE TALK
PEF's
PS&T contract team continues to meet with negotiators from the Governor's Office
of Employee Relations (GOER).
UHC
During the past week negotiators discussed health benefits. Representatives of United Health Care (UHC) participated in a discussion of state proposals to shift significant costs to employees by changing the current reimbursement methodology for services received from non-participating providers in the empire plan from "reasonable and customary" charges to the schedule of allowances adopted by congress for services provided to Medicare recipients. The data provided by UHC illustrated how the proposed change in reimbursement methodology would reduce reimbursement for different procedures and charges. In every example, the reimbursement would be lower than the current model, and in at least one case, the total reimbursement would decrease by more than 80%. Union negotiators suggested that instead of devising ways to shift more cost onto our members, the state‘s (and the insurance company’s) time would be better spent on improving the network of par providers so that enrollees did not have to utilize non-network providers in the first instance.
SELECTION PROCESS
FOR PRESCRIPTION DRUG VENDOR AND ITS POTENTIAL IMPACT ON BARGAINING
The
State has yet to provide specific proposals on how they wish to modify the
current prescription drug program.
Part of
the reason for the delay in providing details is caused by the RFP process to
select a new insurer/vendor for the Prescription Drug Program. The current
two-year contract for the Empire Plan Prescription Drug Program expires on
PEF is
following the vendor selection process closely for multiple reasons. Any change
in vendor will mean potential changes in the Preferred Drug List, with an
unknown number of drugs moving between Preferred and Non-Preferred status. More
important, until the State has selected a new vendor, they will not know what
changes, if any, in the plan design will result from their choice of providers.
Simply put, negotiating drug benefits will not move forward until a vendor is
named and, the contract for their services is signed with the state. According
to a state representative at contract talks on
FAQ
What other unions negotiate with the State and where are they in the process?
The Governor's Office of Employee Relations (GOER) is responsible for negotiating the collective bargaining agreements covering 14 employee units. These units are split between uniformed services and non-uniformed services employees. Unions which represent uniformed services units achieve their economic advances primarily through a process called binding arbitration. The vast majority of the governor’s employees are, like PEF represented employees, in one of the non-uniformed services units, however. Three unions represent over 90% of the non uniformed employees - CSEA - 75,000, UUP- 30,000 and PEF - 58,000.
All of
these contracts are “expired” at this writing. Some of these contracts expired
PEF
representatives maintain contact with the other unions. We can report that no
union has seen any significant progress at the table. CSEA in fact reports on
their website that their negotiators have left the table and told the State to
give them a call when they are prepared to get serious about bargaining. You can
read their contract update at
http://www.csealocal1000.org/
UNION PRESIDENTS TO MEET
Health
insurance is a critical issue to all unions. The state’s health insurance
demands in this round of bargaining include virtually every bad idea they have
ever put on prior bargaining tables. The issues are serious enough
that presidents of many of the unions who negotiate with the Governor’s Office
of Employee Relations (GOER) have a tentative meeting scheduled to the issues
and possible joint response. Stay tuned.
UPCOMING WEEK
Negotiators will return to the bargaining table on Wednesday July 18 when the State is scheduled to discuss their costing out exercise of several key proposals made by PEF.