Chamber Alliance Program Covers Small Businesses

Paul Hickman, owner of Courthouse Concepts in Fayetteville, got excited when his insurance agent called and offered $500 a year in savings on health insurance.

Joe Diederich, owner of Diederich Insurance Service Inc. in Fayetteville, had access to a new product and figured it would save Hickman money on his employee coverage. The product was the Chamber Alliance Program, or CAP, Arkansas’ first health insurance purchasing group.

A state law was passed in 2001 allowing the formation of such groups. In late 2004, the North Little Rock Chamber of Commerce formed CAP to help Chamber members with one to 199 employees buy cheaper health care coverage.

The Chamber works with QualChoice/QCA of Arkansas to underwrite the insurance. To qualify for the CAP, a business must be a member of a participating Arkansas Chamber of Commerce. Those Chambers coordinate with the CAP administrative office within the North Little Rock Chamber of Commerce.

Only agents who are members of their respective Chambers can sell the insurance.

But what started statewide about a year and a half ago is just now catching on in Northwest Arkansas.

The Fayetteville Chamber has offered the CAP coverage to its members since November. Both the Rogers-Lowell Area Chamber and the Bentonville-Bella Vista Chamber have offered it since about January.

CAP health insurance isn’t offered by the Springdale or Siloam Springs Chambers.

The Rogers-Lowell Chamber has signed up 15 to 20 businesses so far.

Virgil Neuroth, vice president of the Fayetteville Chamber, said the program has had mixed success in that town. So far, the Chamber has signed on two businesses and is actively working on signing up 10 others who’ve shown interest.

The Chamber has five agents enlisted and trained to sell the product.

Hickman, one of the first small business owners in the area to sign on to the program, said the savings to his company aren’t huge, but every little bit helps.

Diederich said it’s a good program for the type of customer it’s designed for. The lowest cost plan requires employer to pay about $100 per employee per month (with a $5,000 deductible), he said.

Coverage at that price — if not an ideal deductible — is at least affordable. Employers have a choice to buy lower deductibles for their employees or ask the employees to pay the premium difference. There are four plans available, depending on the number of employees.

“Right now it is the best plan that I have available because it offers multiple plans through one carrier and it has a broad network,” Diederich said.

Francis Browning, CEO of Qualchoice, said there are about 40 Chambers participating with more than 1,000 individuals covered.

He said that during the renewal period of January through March, that non-CAP covered premiums increased an average of 8 percent. CAP covered premiums actually decreased 0.1 percent.

“That’s a small sample and early results,” he said, but it’s “promising.”

When asked what the catch is to the CAP program, Browning said, “I really think the ‘gotcha’ is, there is no ‘gotcha.’