About the H.O.P.E. Trust
With escalating costs in the healthcare industry, and premium volatility at an all-time high, tax supported entities in Illinois are finding it more and more difficult to budget for the cost of their employee health care benefits.
The H.O.P.E. Trust (Health Options for Public Entities) was created by a group of four founding Illinois counties which banded together in 2012 to create an innovative alternative to both traditional commercial insurance markets and self-funded health plans. By having local governmental entities partner together for the purpose of creating a larger pool of insured individuals, the Trust is able to negotiate better insurance rates for the group participants in the Trust while still maintaining a variety of plan options and personalized service. The Trust has grown in size as additional counties, cities, villages and other public entities have seen the benefit in uniting to create cost stability and control.
Unlike most HOPE Trust competitors, the vast majority of annual rate changes to the HOPE Trust’s range of standard benefit plan offerings have been single digit percentages. Additionally, the HOPE Trust has maintained 99.5% retention of its participating employers since inception. The HOPE Trust has even paid back dividends to its member employers in both 2016 and in 2017.
Many counties, municipalities and other public entities offer health care benefits that cannot be reduced or significantly altered due to collective bargaining agreements. The H.O.P.E. Trust offers a variety of plan options, and each can be tailored to mirror current benefit levels.
The H.O.P.E. Trust Healthcare Plan is sponsored by employers participating in the Health Options for Public Entities Joint Self-Insurance Risk Pool Association, with Snedeker Risk Management, Ltd. as the designated Plan Administrator.
Contact us to learn more about the H.O.P.E. Trust and its health care plans.
The HOPE Trust does not have its own website. However, SRM as Plan Admistrator is sharing the following link, which leads to the machine-readable files that are made available in response to the federal Transparency in Coverage Rule and includes negotiated service rates and out-of-network allowed amounts between health plans and healthcare providers. The machine-readable files are formatted to allow researchers, regulators, and application developers to access and analyze data more easily. healthcarebluebook.com/TrustmarkHB
