How to get discounted health insurance rates in NY for small businesses.

 New York is one of the few community rated states for health insurance.   What does this mean?   It means in NY state health insurance rates are determined by the community that the plans are being offered in.   NY is divided into 8 regions or communities.   They are NY City which also includes Westchester and Rockland Counties,  there is Long Island which include Nassau and Suffolk Counties,  there is the Albany area,  there is the Mid Hudson region,  there is the Rochester area, the Syracuse area, Utica area and the Buffalo area.   So in each of these communities small businesses with less than 100 employees all receive the same rate for the same health insurance plan.   So how can a NY small business get a discounted rate.   Small businesses can receive their health insurance benefits through a Professional Employer Organization instead of buying the insurance on their own directly with an insurance company.   A professional Employer Organization or PEO is a company that essentially becomes your small businesses human resources department.   Your employees become shared employees of record with the PEO.   The PEO then takes care of all of your businesses HR needs and requirements,  including health insurance benefits, payroll services, workplace compliance, workers comp. , DBL, PFL etc...   You are still in control of hiring, firing and training your employees.   Now back to the original point of getting discounted health insurance benefits.   Since PEO's are large businesses with thousands of shared employees they have full discretion of their health insurance rates to their small business partners.   Rates are usually determined by demographic information, utilization history and business type.   So a small business with favorable demographics, ( younger employees ) and favorable business type ( white collar ) tend to get highly discounted health insurance rates compared to community rating.   These discounts can be anywhere from 15% to 50%.    In addition PEO's make your human resources much easier to deal with and keep you in government compliance at all times.   Contact us today with any questions about PEO's.