SWA Health Insurance

[bluestreaking]

Who does SWA use for their health insurance?

Thanks,
Bluestreaking

 

[Cactus-Wrench]

Don't know for positive if it is company wide but Mx uses United Health Care.

 

[Slug]

UHC

United Health Care is it.

 

[SWAdude]

SWA is self insured. They use UHC as the administrator of the benefits. If that makes any difference to you.

The company also offers HMO coverage if you choose. Once every year our employees choose the type of coverage they receive. The choices are numerous and are competitive to any major airlines that I am aware of.

SWAdude

 

[JumpJetter]

Does that coverage continue at age 60 when you retire? At least until reaching 65 and being eligible for medi-care?

thanks
JJ

 

[SWAdude]

Does that coverage continue at age 60 when you retire? At least until reaching 65 and being eligible for medi-care?

Not entirely. We have a sick pay buyback that you can get those five years with 600 trips of sick pay for a program that is different from a current employee. I really don't know the details because I am 17 years away from retirement and that will likely change by the time I get there. It is an issue that we need to and will work on.

SWAdude

I must also add that you accrue a sick bank by getting 10% of all trips earned. IE you earn 100 trips in a month you accrue 10 sick trips.

 

[B6Busdriver]

Is it true health care at SWA is free for all employees? Thanks.

 

[a320drivr]

A SWA guy told me he pays like 34 a month for a family of four. Pretty **CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED** good.

 

[SWAdude]

Free is available on one of the plans we have to choose from. But to receive some extra benefits there are what I consider to be nominal fees.

SWAdude

 

[canyonblue]

I pay $15 per month to cover our family of 4. My wife, who works at another Airline used to get free medical but that has been replaced with a rather large monthly payment (@ $204.00), so we just use our SWA as the primary now. When we had her free medical I would choose the D Medical plan at SWA. It was only basic coverage but was a nice addition to my wifes coverage. When I chose this plan SWA would PAY ME $42.00 a month since I did not take the High End plan. That was a great deal. We now use her airlines "basic" coverage which is free, but they don't give her back any money to take it.

 

[Resume Writer]

I have a question. When I was at SWA, I was pregnant with Katelyn. There was no paid maternity leave, but here is what I was told and found truly amazing.

The Benefits department told me that if someone takes Short Term Disability, that 1) there is no pay at all, (unless you have sick pay, which would not last long and then Long Term Disability which kicks in at 6 months off, unless you do the buy-up and it starts at 4 months)and 2) that after 120 days your medical insurance stops and you are forced to pay for COBRA insurance. Is this true for all the workgroups?

If this is true, then if someone breaks their leg and is out for six weeks and has only been there for say 6 months, and the average rate of accrual of sick days is 5 per year, then that person is out of luck for the rest of the six weeks?

I was also told by the Benefits Department that the Employee Catastrophic Fund was for "just this reason." When I had signed up for it, I was told that it was to help employees if their house was destroyed by a natural disaster, etc. If it is true that this money is used to help other employees with medical issues, then would you say that as employees you are paying the "STD" for your fellow employees, which essentially the company should be paying?

I worked on the ground, so as I said, I am not sure if it is the same for all workgroups and if what the benefits department told me was true.

Anyone?

Kathy

 

[canyonblue]

Yes that is true. My wife works for another Major Airline and when she was pregnant with our two children she was essentially in the same boat as you. She did however have a Short Term Disability policy with AFLAC that had a pregnancy rider on it that did pay while she was off. As far as other injuries, at SWA in New-Training you have the option to opt in to Pilot Aid and, as the case with a classmate of mine, if you find yourself without sick time left Pilot-Aid will kick in. It did for him and he actually made more while off than if he had flown his line.