Health care consortium open to local manufacturers

The Missouri Department of Insurance approved the Southwest Area Manufacturers Association for the SAMA I Health Care Consortium, allowing member businesses to be viewed as one employer group with a uniform insurance plan.

Mercy Health Plans won the competitive bidding process to provide health insurance coverage to SAMA's 32 member organizations, representing about 1,300 employees.

Both large and small manufacturing companies, with as few as three employees, can join, though to qualify they must be SAMA members for at least six months.

The consortium allows six companies in SAMA to offer health insurance to employees that weren’t able to offer it previously.

SAMA members can attend an informational meeting at 4 p.m. Nov. 14 in St. John’s Hammons Heart Institute Multipurpose Room.

Associations like SAMA have received health coverage through Mercy Health Plans in the public sector since 1997, but SAMA is Mercy’s first association in the private sector.

The Small Employer Health Insurance Availability Act ordinarily prevents small employers from being included in insurance consortiums, but the Department of Insurance’s waiver suspends the restriction for two years. The department will evaluate the effectiveness of the arrangement at the end of that time and choose whether to approve it again.

SAMA membership is open to all manufacturers in southwest Missouri.