TravisCobra to add Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) Administration, "State-Specific" Continuation Capabilities, Other New Features

The IRS has recently confirmed that the new Healthcare Reimbursement Account (HRA) is a Group Health Plan subject to COBRA. Also, administering the various state health continuation laws for small groups has been receiving more attention during the past few years. Travis is going to respond to both of these requirements!

During the Fall of 2002, Travis Software will release a new module that will become part of TravisCobra and its "family" of benefit continuation administration systems that will help users meet the capabilities of the specific State Health Insurance Continuation Laws. We're also adding HRA administration under COBRA to the basic TravisCobra system at the same time.

TravisCobra is being modified so that the system may be used to offer continuation to participants in the new Healthcare Reimbursement Arrangements (HRA's). A portion of the modifications to be made to the system will include a link between TravisCobra and the Company's TravisFlex system, allowing a direct "feed" of new qualifying beneficiary information from TravisFlex to TravisCobra when users have both systems. Since HRA balances may be used to pay COBRA premiums, a transaction is being added to TravisCobra that will allow the payment of premiums from the HRA.

The "State- Specific" functions are being added so that system users may offer group health plan continuation administrations services to employers who must meet the requirements of a particular state's insurance continuation laws rather than the Federal COBRA law. Over 40 states have such laws, and the rules about what benefits should be offered, for how long, at what cost and what enrollment periods must be met by the participant, vary widely. By using one or more state's "rules," TravisCobra users will be able to administer group health continuation for large as well as small groups without system operators having to learn each of the individual state's requirements.

Each state's rules concerning eligibility for continuation, length of enrollment and payment period, premium calculation and conversion availability are being built into TravisCobra. As a result, if a loss of coverage occurs in a small group that has to comply with one of the state continuation laws, the State-Specific Module will automatically print election notices offering the correct length of continuation required by the state law, requiring a response by the appropriate dates and calculating the correct premium(s) for the plans being offered. Ongoing premium billing and remittance eligibility reporting is also supported, as are summary reports of continuation activity.

Another major enhancement to be included in Release 7.0 is the New "Download File Mapper" which will allow user to take data files (Excel, text, etc.) in any format and "translate" those files into the TravisFlex Download Module format. The Downloading Module allows the importing of new employee and new qualified beneficiary information, sharply reducing the need for keyboard entry of data.

Additionally, the new release will contain features suggested by our users such as the ability to print billing coupons just to the end of the current plan year, an option to print separate HIPAA Coverage Certificates for individual QB's, and any changes required by the Trade Act of 2002, once it is enacted.

Contact Info:
Travis Software
Garth Williams
Vice President
(281) 496-3737