Because they've been shown to improve the health and well-being of workers, many business owners have implemented wellness programs into their employee benefits programs in an effort to improve productivity and cut down on absences stemming from sickness. To encourage staff members to participate, companies have been known to provide various incentives that reward individuals for achieving certain accomplishments, like losing weight or lowering blood pressure readings.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has taken exception to this, however, and recently filed a lawsuit against an international consumer product company, contending that providing incentives to participate in wellness programs violates federal law because it compels workers to take part.
The National Business Group on Health has since called out the EEOC, saying that filing a lawsuit against a company that runs an incentive-based wellness program may have serious repercussions that could be counterproductive to these initiatives.
Brian Marcotte, NBGH president and CEO, pointed out that the outcome of a lawsuit may lead to fewer companies offering wellness initiatives, which when implemented effectively improve not only employee health but employers' bottom lines.
"Adverse legal actions will have a chilling effect on these programs and will jeopardize incentives for all employees who have benefited from them," said Marcotte in a press release. "We recommend that policymakers consider well-designed wellness programs that comply with HIPAA and the [Affordable Care Act] compliant with American with Disabilities Act and Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008."
Wellness programs frequently incentive laden, polls show
Incentive-based wellness programs are quite common in the U.S. Based on polling data from NBGH, roughly 75 percent of employer use incentives to encourage workers to join. Other survey statistics suggest the rate is around 90 percent among employers with 500 workers or more, National Public Radio reported.
In a letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which is affiliated with the EEOC, Business Roundtable president John Engler wrote that the lawsuit being filed by the government undermines the positive effects of wellness programs.
"First and foremost, these programs educate employees on their existing health risk factors," said Engler. "These programs then provide employees with motivating incentives that encourage them to take action towards improving health risk factors that may result in longer term health problems."
He also called it "shameful" that litigation would result from well-meaning employee benefit programs that serve as a win-win for both employees and employers.
Most workers are favorable to wellness initiatives. In a recent poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation, 80 percent of workers are supportive of them. Where employers and employees may not see things eye to eye are in situations where workers have to pay higher premiums for not meeting a health-related goal. The same survey found that nearly 75 percent of people are against linking premium payments with failing to meet certain well-being objectives.
"Workers are happy to go along so long as they see wellness as a benefit that improves their sense of well-being, rather than an effort to intrude on their privacy or make them pay more for health coverage," wrote Drew Altman, KFF CEO and president in The Wall Street Journal.
Nearly half of all employers offer a wellness program, according to the KFF survey.
