Watch for Revised Group Benefits SMMs this Week
Once you’ve completed distribution, complete the acknowledgments and return them to NRECA.
Watch the Message Center this week for an alert notifying benefits administrators that new medical, dental, vision, short-term disability, long-term disability and business travel accident insurance summary of material modifications (SMM) documents have been posted on the Employee Benefits website. These SMMs correct and clarify the summary plan description (SPD) documents issued in December. Both the new SMMs and the SPDs and SMMs you received in December must be distributed by March 1.
Don’t forget to review all SPDs and SMMs for accuracy before distribution.
All NRECA medical plans received summary plan description (SPD) documents for 2014. Other plans in the group benefits program received SMMs for 2014, unless your co-op’s plan elections changed during annual review or your co-op enrolled in a new benefit plan, in which case you received a full SPD. These documents were released originally in December 2013.
Both the December documents and the new SMMs are located on the Employee Benefits website at Document Library > Summary Plan Descriptions > Group Plan SPDs SMMs.
Distribution acknowledgement is required
As soon as you give out the SPDs and SMMs, fill out the online distribution and acknowledgement form for each plan. The form is on the Employee Benefits website at Administration > My Co-op’s Insurance > Group Plan SPD and SMM Distribution. Select your subgroup, if applicable. A link to this page also is in the Message Center alert you received in December.
Helpful resource
A table summarizing the SPD and SMM changes for 2014 by plan also is online. Go to Document Library > Documents for Co-ops > Insurance Plans > All Plans > 2014 SPD Updates.
If you have questions about downloading SPDs and SMMs, contact the Member Contact Center at 1.866.673.2299 or contactcenter@nreca.coop.
For all other questions about SPDs or SMMs, contact the benefits compliance team at 1.866.673.2299, option 7, or at group.compliance@nreca.coop.