Open enrollment for 2021 begins Thursday (Oct. 29) and continues until 5 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 24 (two days before Thanksgiving), giving employees the opportunity to make benefits choices for the year ahead.

Information packets from the UC Office of the President should be arriving by mail to home addresses this week. A systemwide virtual Benefits Fair, with “booths,” videos and chat sessions with benefits representatives, opened this morning (Oct. 27) and will continue 24 hours a day, seven days a week, until the close of open enrollment.

In addition, UCPath is presenting one-hour webinars at various times and on various days through Nov. 23, providing an overview of open enrollment options and changes, plus information on navigating the open enrollment process in UCPath. See the schedule here; register by clicking on the date and time of your choosing.

The UC Davis Health Care Facilitator Program is not offering in-person presentations, due to the pandemic. Look for a 2021 update to the program’s Medical Plan Overview, including videos, available on demand.

During open enrollment, benefits-eligible employees can:

• Enroll in or opt out of UC-sponsored medical, dental and/or vision plans.
• Transfer to a different medical or dental plan.
• Enroll in legal insurance.
• Add or remove eligible family members to/from medical, dental, vision and/or legal plans.
• Enroll or re-enroll in flexible spending accounts, of FSAs, for health and/or dependent care.

If you are not making any changes, you need take no action during open enrollment. Note about flexible spending accounts: They do not renew automatically; you must re-enroll annually.

UC Davis clinic on campus

Medical plan options are the same as this year’s (with some modifications within the plans). UC Davis Health, a provider in all but one plan, will soon offer the added convenience of a clinic on the Davis campus. The 4,000-square-foot clinic, in a new building that is nearing completion at the southeast corner of Hutchison Drive and Dairy Road, is expected to open by the end of the year. The campus clinic is in addition to the Davis clinic on West Covell Boulevard.

The medical plan lineup includes two health maintenance organizations, or HMOs, UC Blue & Gold and Kaiser Permanente, and three preferred provider organizations, UC Care, UC Health Savings Plan and CORE.

Of the two HMOs, only Blue & Gold includes UC Davis Health as a provider, while Kaiser operates its own health care system.

‘Local’ Blue & Gold rates

The Blue & Gold rates shown on the UCnet website and printed in the open enrollment brochure do not apply to employees of UC Davis, UC Davis Health and Davis-based Agriculture and Natural Resources. Blue & Gold rates, in fact, are lower for these “local” employees, thanks to subsidies that bring the rates down to equal Kaiser’s, as shown on an insert included in open enrollment packets. Read more about the Blue & Gold premium subsidies.

Kaiser and “local” Blue & Gold monthly premiums are increasing $2 to $6, while the rates for UC Care, UC Health Savings Plan and CORE are unchanged for 2021.

UC Davis Human Resources’ Medical Plan Rates webpage shows all the rates, including the local Blue & Gold rates.

Cost-sharing changes

• Kaiser Permanente HMO and UC Blue & Gold HMO — Emergency room copayments will climb $50, to $125, if the patient is not admitted to the hospital.
• UC Care — A number of cost-sharing changes are described in this UCnet article.

Other highlights

• New administrator for flexible spending accounts — Discovery Benefits will be the new administrator, offering one account, one card and one mobile app for health and dependent care FSAs — simply snap a photo with your phone to submit a claim or documentation.
• Legal insurance — New diversity and inclusion services are being added to further support the needs of UC’s diverse population, including domestic partnership agreements, funeral directives, hospital visitation authorizations and gender identifier changes on government-issued documents.
• Lower premiums for supplemental and expanded dependent life insurance — The decreases average 7 percent.
• Higher premiums for voluntary long-term disability — The increases average $10.50 per month. Costs vary depending on age, earnings and date of hire. 

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