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Rylan Klaseen & Associates
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My Book "Bill Please": Consumers Driving Health Care is Published!

11/10/2016

 
(Two Books:
"Bill Please": Consumers Driving Health Care
480 pages
(Coming Soon!) Fill The Gap: Saving Consumer-Driven Health Care
480 pages

Inspired by the Choose Your Adventure® books I read as a boy, I decided to write two books with two different calls to action in addressing consumers driving health care:

1) “Bill Please,” which calls for consumers to create a “Bill Please” Revolution by posting their medical bills & stories, and all the health care players to join in the conversation.

2) Fill The Gap, which calls for employers as well as consumers to fill the gap caused by Consumer-Driven High Deductible Health Plans with inexpensive gap insurance to ensure we keep moving towards the transparent, accountable, affordable health care system we all desire. (Coming soon!)
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Purchase your copy today on Amazon - then join the "Bill Please" Revolution by posting your medical bills and telling your story!


Description:

Bill Please: Consumers Driving Health Care

There are hundreds of books out there by economists, policymakers, journalists, and even doctors trying to fix health care. They are all urgent and necessary because spending over 19% of our GDP on less than the highest quality health care is not sustainable - and, frankly, American citizens deserve better.

Rylan Klaseen has a different take than most. As an entrepreneur, and business owner, leading a group employee benefits firm, he’s out in the trenches daily assisting employers and employees in riding the waves of health care reform, while innovating the most cost efficient, high quality health plan blends he can.

The current state of Americans’ health and health care is covered, but there is no blame game here, just very specific calls to action - exactly the type of pragmatic approach you would expect from someone in the thick of it who has to make it happen.

In this book, he reveals how we all had a hand in creating our opaque $3 trillion health care system - and how we can all fix it.

He proves why consumers must take the wheel if we are to achieve the transparent, accountable, affordable health care system we all want and desperately need.

-He calls for consumers to start a “Bill Please” Revolution, enabling all to post medical bills in a collective forum, creating a grassroots push to immediate transparency and accountability.

-He calls for providers, and pharmaceuticals to post their prices, their research, and their outcomes in easy-to-understand language.

-He calls for insurers to post their premiums and their coverage clearly.

-He calls for employers to post their benefit successes.

-He calls for entrepreneurs to post their health care innovations and achievements.

-He calls for public servants (politicians and academic policymakers) to listen and engage with we the taxpayers, we the consumers, we the people.  

-He calls for all to join the conversation, leaning forward until we reach our goal.

and more…

This book is a must read for consumers and imperative for all of the players in our U.S. health care system.

The exciting news is that the consumer-driven health care train is leaving the station. Get on board or be left behind.

Purchase your copy today on Amazon - and let's do this!

Media Kit


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Why Gap Insurance? Americans Aren't Saving

8/30/2016

 
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CDHDs & HSAs. "There is just one fatal flaw with this picture that is keeping employees from getting the health care they need."

I only see one major medical insurance carrier doing this any more in Southern California, but they all used to require any agent getting appointed to sell their insurance to vow, in writing, not to add supplemental onto their plans. Why? They were trying to sell their more expensive platinum plans to employers that covered everything. Some of us vaguely remember 1st dollar coverage, right? If supplemental gap insurance was offered to an employer, they would figure out that they could save a lot of money by going with the least expensive high-deductible plan, covering the employee’s deductible with inexpensive gap insurance.

Oh how times have changed. With the underlying health care costs out of control, premiums became out of reach for most employers, who then insisted on the least expensive, consumer-driven, high-deductible plans, adding on an HSA. And here we are.

There is just one fatal flaw with this picture that is keeping employees from getting the health care they need. Americans aren’t saving. I’m not here to point fingers or assess blame, it’s just our current reality. The personal savings rate in America is around 4.4 percent, which is a huge fall from 2012’s 10.5 percent. Almost half of Americans would not be able to cover an unanticipated expense of $500, and almost a quarter wouldn’t be able to cover even $100. Yet today's deductibles can reach as high as $10,000 before insurance kicks in.

"The personal savings rate in America is around 4.4 percent, which is a huge fall from 2012’s 10.5 percent."

Given this reality, gap insurance is now a necessity. Most major carriers realize this and have stopped requiring agents to sign a promise not to partner CDHDs and gap insurance. In fact, most of them are now offering supplemental insurance as well. I’m just curious why it still seems to be hush-hush. Why isn’t the administration, in pushing CDHDs on the ACA exchanges, and preaching consumer-driven health care for all, speaking about the necessity of gap insurance, while Americans adjust to saving for high-deductibles? It needs to be shouted from the mountaintops. Right now, I’m in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado for the Labor Day weekend - so that’s what I’m doing. Have a safe, healthy and enjoyable holiday. When you get back to work, make sure your employees, whose labor you value, have access to gap insurance as part of your benefit offerings so they can access the health care they need to keep being productive for your business.

Source: Lake, R. 05/18/2016. 23 Dizzying average American savings statistics. Retrieved 8/30/16 from: https://www.creditdonkey.com/average-american-savings-statistics.html

ACA Causing Employers to Look to Voluntary

2/25/2015

 
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Benefits Pro study showing that more employers are looking to move certain benefits to voluntary.
It's interesting in the Wild, Wild West of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) how there are so many predictions about what will happen.  One of those predictions was that voluntary group benefits would become more relevant. 

While some predictions have not materialized, a new study by Benefits Pro suggests this prediction is indeed coming to pass.

The study showed that more employers are looking to make changes to their benefits plan today than they were two years ago.  More than three in 10 are considering changes that head towards voluntary, and 17 percent are "very likely" or "likely" to slide certain benefits over to voluntary.

The targets are vision coverage, dental insurance, disability insurance (both short-term and long-term) and life insurance.

In addition to transitioning these existing benefits into voluntary, 14 percent of employers are "very likely" or "likely" to add new voluntary benefits over the next 12 to 18 months.



The difference in employers' answers to these questions between 2014 and 2012 is telling, and is explaining why 37% of group voluntary brokers report they are providing significantly more voluntary policies over the same time period.

I don't think we are anywhere near out of the Wild, Wild West of the Affordable Care Act, so keep your seat belt on.  We'll all be glad when we're dealing with a known rather than a constantly morphing law.

As we navigate towards consumer-driven health care, making voluntary a key player only makes sense. 
The goal, after all, is to offer the best benefits package in the most cost efficient way to your employees.

Source:
Is PPACA pushing voluntary sales? | BenefitsPro 2/19/15, 3:36 PM http://www.benefitspro.com/2015/02/17/is-ppaca-pushing-voluntary-sales
| BY GIL LOWERRE AND BONNIE
BRAZZELL

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    Rylan Klaseen

    Rylan Klaseen & Associates

    Serving Southern California:
    Tailored Benefits Delivery
    316 W 2nd Street
    Suite 500

    Los Angeles
    CA 90012
    Cell: (909)243-4886

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Rylan Klaseen & Associates          Tailored Benefits Delivery          Serving Southern California
316 W 2nd Street, Suite 500, Los Angeles, CA 90012 Cell 909-243-4886