my advisors plan is to first incur the loss.. pay the penalty. then petition based on inabilty of measurement system to accurately gauge the bmi. uncertainty of measurement method exceeds the thresholds given.
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Honeywell self insures its health insurance coverage. Since Honeywell is taking the risk and ALSO the employer they have the ability to implement these types of rules & fees (as opposed to a 3rd party insurer who doesn't control your paycheck). Honeywell can rationalize these actions because ultimately unhealthy employees impact the premiums & wages of every other employee.
This is precisely why single payer government funded healthcare is terrible. Your ability to determine your healthcare decisions with your physician become compromised when everyone is responsible for everyone else's expenses.
Basically Honeywell is just stacking up the reasons to quit so the don't pay severance to reach the next OEF (organization efficiency factor=layoffs). Darius said there will be no stranded costs which also means cuts for those who don't realize
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401k penalty
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BMI penalty in 2019
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Cell phone reduction and pressure to connect your personal phone to company
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Forced to join HI-PAC - pay after tax to HONEYWELL for their bribes
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No work from home -but you should at night to join China and India calls
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Forced % into performance review elbow
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Low pay raises in USA
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Promotion only if you will relocate to a HUB and move at your own expense
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Pension salary increases frozen in retirement calculations
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And the list goes on......
The penalty is indeed real. I voluntarily refused to take the biometric screening for two years and was penalized $1500 as a result (if one does not elect to take the screening, one is considered a tobacco user by default and is penalized $1500 to be added to your medical benefit over the course of the year-approx..$57 every two weeks). I was concerned with this information being handled by a third party concern whose security measures could not be validated (I know it is only medical information and not personal information but my rationale is why give them more than they should need in the first place?).
I bought a house so eventually I had to subject myself to the screening to get back the extra $57 that should have been mine without question (because I worked for it).
The annual targets are real-you are expected to improve your stats over the course of the year or be penalized. I predicted a system such as this coming into place a long time ago when companies first started adopting comprehensive health management in the workplace. Such systems could eventually extend beyond the workplace, affecting one's food choices for the sake of "health management" (e.g., one can not order pizza or purchase certain foods as this information is now integrated into a national health database).
BMI (Body Mass Index) has been known for many years to be grossly inaccurate for gauging obesity levels as it does not account for one's muscle mass or one's water weight. It has also been shown that the link between being overweight (which accounts for the majority of society) and diabetes, stroke, heart disease, etc. is not a 100% certainty. Obesity (not simply being overweight) carries a much higher risk but is not guaranteed to result in a certain illness. Bodybuilders are frequently considered obese as well as individuals prone to water retention. There is equipment capable of assessing a person's fat mass/muscle mass ratio to determine this. Of course there are still those you can simply look at and tell what they are :).
@HKU
As part of the annual biometrics announcement this year, employees were informed that if their biometrics show they have a BMI of X (I think it was 35?) and they have not reduced the BMI to Y (really don't remember the target) by the next biometrics screening, that such employees will have to pay more - along the lines of what tobacco users pay.
If that makes sense to you. It's early and I'm not writing well :P
-lrx troll
Fat men and women are the best employees because they need the company to subsidize their medical insurance costs and are too low energy to get promoted. Keep squealing piggy!
This (developing high BMI) I just another
MFing penalty for being a loyal employee who works hard, works long extra unpaid hours under high stress, upper management pressure, intimidation, get PIPFckd, can't work from home, have to commute 2 or 3 hours per day beyond 2 hour unpaid extra hours daily
the result is eating sh--ty fast food out of vending machine instead of dinner with the wife and kids,
no time for excercise, getting fat and angry,
and either having a nervous breakdown,
debilitating stroke with permanent cognitive impact,
heart attack,
divorce, child custody battle,
jumping from SSO stairwell with a cable around your neck,
or stepping in front of a train
to end the pain
otherwise, great place to work !
enjoy !
can barely wait to see the management troll responses !
This confuses me. I know I have high BMI (I've gained 50 lbs in the past 10 years I've worked here), but I did not receive any penalty or have been notified there may be penalties. What am I missing?
I will be paying to survey all employees in the usarea out of my pocket. My goal is to demonstrate that the bMI penalty is disproportionately impacting minority groups in the us worker population. Please respond when you get the survey. Good luck honeywell
The EEOC was NOT able to demonstrate that the aforementioned biometric testing would jeopardize the employee’s right to privacy of their health information.
@msp - see this lawsuit - if you have concerns, hire an attorney, find legal help.
sue...
http://www.startribune.com/government-sues-honeywell-over-employee-wellness-program/280726482/
can they legally do this?
you have a thread on this here
I called the benefits number given in the open enrollment email yesterday that describes the Fat tax. I wanted to know how to get an exemption on the BMI . ( There are those of us with medically conditions taking meds that no matter how hard we try we cant lower the BMI. ) They hook me up with some foreigner who knows nothing. Say we have to wait into next year and they will tell us.