FAQs About the Guild’s Partnership With LIG Solutions

What is LIG Solutions?

LIG Solutions is an insurance advisor with experience in the health, life, and Medicare insurance industry. LIG Solutions offers insurance solutions for associations and their members, societies, membership organizations, and other affinity groups. LIG Solutions helps connect people to a variety of coverage plans through health insurance exchanges or marketplaces. LIG Solutions’ agents can help you understand your benefits and different plan options to determine what insurance is right for you. LIG’s services are free. Health insurance plans do not cost more if you buy through LIG’s agents.

Generally, health insurance agents represent one carrier. However, LIG broadens consumers’ choices and can sell insurance from many insurance companies in your state. For example, here is a list of some carriers LIG represents (this is not a comprehensive list and availability is based on your geographic location):

The Guild joined a coalition of book industry organizations in April 2018 to create an appropriate partner for an association-sponsored health insurance program. Initially, the coalition’s goal was to create an association health plan (AHP). The coalition was formed following a presidential executive order that expanded eligibility for organizations to pool resources across state lines to offer members health insurance at negotiated rates.

However, the coalition’s goal had to be modified when the executive order was deemed illegal. The government appealed the ruling, and the case is still in the courts. The coalition was hopeful there would be a court decision regarding AHPs that would expand health insurance options for all of our members. However, the partnership with LIG Solutions is a step in the right direction while we continue to await a decision on the legality of expanded AHPs.

With expanded AHPs currently off the table, the coalition began looking for a company that would provide coalition members with extensive knowledge of the health insurance market to help members navigate the wide array of insurance options, including ACA-compliant major medical, Medicare/supplements, short term policies, vision, dental, critical care, supplemental coverage, and small group/Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRAs) programs.

Additionally, it was important to the coalition that all stores and their employees could take advantage of the benefit, including individual members and their immediate family; business owners and their W2 employees; 1099-employees/independent contractors; association volunteers; and association staff and their immediate family.

The health insurance partnership with LIG Solutions meets these revised goals. With LIG Solutions, health insurance coverage is offered concierge style to members in a centralized portal, eliminating much of the burden and cutting through confusion that normally accompanies shopping for health insurance. A variety of health insurance options are sourced from carriers in all 50 states and Washington D.C.

No, this partnership does not allow the Graphic Artists Guild or the coalition to negotiate rates for insurance premiums as these are set with federal or state legislators. An executive order that allowed for associations like the Graphic Artists Guild to create Association Health Plans and use economies of scale to negotiate better rates for insurance premiums is currently tied up in courts. That said, LIG Solutions’ knowledge of the industry, we hope, may result in some members finding better insurance solutions of which they were unaware. In general, however, you should not expect lower health insurance costs. LIG Solutions’ prime benefits are providing expertise and choice to our members along with many different coverage types.

The partnership with LIG Solutions will benefit you and your employees in the following ways:

The partnership will be co-branded between the Graphic Artists Guild and LIG and offered to Graphic Artists Guild members and their employees. The Graphic Artists Guild will have a unique landing page just for our members, as well as a unique phone number, health and wellness content, and other no-cost tools.

LIG Solutions is in the process of creating the Graphic Artist Guild’s unique landing page. The Graphic Artists Guild will notify members once this page is up and running. The Graphic Artists Guild is committed to launching the program by the fall.

Once the landing page is live, you will be able to log in and enter your information via a form on the site. The form asks if you are seeking health insurance for just yourself or for you and your employees as part of a group/HRA program. As an employer, you can choose not to check the box for your employees and instead ask your employees to use The Graphic Artists Guild’s landing page to get their own insurance. You will then be contacted by a LIG Solutions representative who will walk you through your options based on your own individual/family needs or those of your business/employees. The latter option is the group/Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) program; if you choose to offer an HRA, your employees can then use the Graphic Artists Guild’s landing page to buy their own insurance with the pretax funds you provide.

If you prefer that your employees seek coverage on their own (or you have chosen to offer an HRA), your employees can simply follow the above process.

It depends on if the employees purchased an individual/family plan or are part of the group/HRA program.

If an employee is paying for 100 percent of their own plan, the employee can keep the plan until it becomes renewal time. The employee technically owns the plan since they pay for it even though the employee gained access to the Graphic Artists Guild program through their employer. LIG Solutions has a couple of ways they can handle this at renewal time. Legally the Guild, and/or LIG Solutions can not make an employee stop using a plan that they pay for out of their own pocket. At renewal time, LIG Solutions can be given a list of employees who should not be able to utilize the Guild coverage program.

It is a similar situation if an employee is part of the group/HRA program. In this case, the employee still has an individual/family plan; however, the employer is paying for a portion of the plan (just like a traditional group plan). The biggest difference is that once an employee leaves the store, the store will no longer be contributing any money to the former employee’s coverage. The former employee will have to pick-up 100 percent of the costs at that point (or cancel). Similarly, at renewal time, LIG Solutions can be given a list of employees who should not be able to utilize the Graphic Artists Guild coverage program. This will be done through the HRA as part of the established process for that part of the program.