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Important Information About How and When health reform affects you

The federal health reform law, Affordable Care Act, passed in March 2010, requires insurers to make specific benefit additions to certain plans.

To find out which additions apply to your plan, first determine whether you have Grandfathered or Non Grandfathered status for your plan by reviewing the FAQ on Grandfathering. As long as a group or policyholder maintains grandfathered status, a limited subset of the required federal health reform law benefit additions apply, starting on your renewal date.

For all plans other than Medicare and Medicaid plans, these additions will usually go into effect on the policyholders' benefit renewal date. The renewal date is typically the 1st of the month, and is usually based upon the original policy start date. One example is the dependent care coverage provision which enables adult children up to age 26 (end of month of birthday) to be covered under the parents' policy. This, and other health reform provisions, will go into effect for City of New York employees and dependents on July 1, 2011, the renewal date of that program's policy. All other group policyholders will have the enhancements effective on the issue or renewal date anytime after September, 23, 2010. Please contact your benefits administrator or call Customer Service at the number on the back of your ID card for more information about your effective date.

Please review the FAQ on Grandfathering to find out the specific details for information on the full set of benefit enhancements affecting your policy on its issue or renewal date.