Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) Open Enrollment

Alerus provides employees with access to educational and plan resources on our online Employee Resource Center.

Enrollment forms (if needed for internal use) and other employer plan resources can be downloaded from the Employer Resource Center.

ACTION ITEMS

Due Date	Action Item	Description	Submission Instructions	Form Required
Two months before plan year begins	Plan Design Changes	If you desire to make changes to your plan design (change claim submission deadlines, change annual benefit amounts, add debit cards, etc.), submit these changes.	Employer Website – Requests>New Request	N/A
One month before plan year begins	HRA New Plan Year Form	Complete, execute, and submit your HRA New Plan Year Form.	Employer Website – Requests>New Request	HRA New Plan Year Form (found on the Employer Website under Tools>Resources)
One month before plan year begins	HRA Medicare Reporting Form	Complete, execute, and submit your HRA Medicare Reporting Form.	Employer Website – Requests>New Request	HRA Medicare Reporting Form (found on the Employer Website under Tools>Resources)
One month before plan year begins	Debit Card Copays	If your plan is debit card enabled, submit your group health copays.	Employer Website – Requests>New Request	Debit Card Copay Template
One month before plan year begins	Participant and Dependent Enrollments	Submit your new plan year participant and dependent enrollments.	Submission methods listed in the "Enrollment Submissions" section of this page.	N/A

HRA Plan Design Review

Review the HRA New Plan Year Form located in Tools>Resources section of the Employer Website. This form is also available to enrolled participants within the participant website under Tools & Support.

If there are any changes to your HRA plan design, contact Alerus through the Requests section of the Employer Website no later than two months before the start of your new plan year with any changes.

Once any changes are made to your plan design, Alerus will update the employer website with your new HRA New Plan Year Form with the updated plan design. This form is in Tools > Resources. Submit the form to Alerus through the Requests section of the Employer Website. Once this form is received, we will finalize your new plan year.

If the HRA New Plan Year Form is received after the submission deadline, a $500 mid-year plan change fee may apply.

If you have any plan design changes, your plan documents will need to be amended.

If Alerus writes your plan documents, we will make these amendments for you. Applicable document fees may apply. For reference, Alerus plan documents can be found under the Resources section of the Employer Website.
If Alerus does not write your plan document, you will need to contact your plan document provider to ensure that any applicable plan document amendments are completed (if necessary).

Enrollment Submissions

PARTICIPANT ENROLLMENTS
Participant information can be submitted to Alerus:

ENROLLMENT FILE
File Feed: If you have a secure file feed established between your HRIS system and Alerus, the new plan year enrollments may be able to be submitted through this file feed. Connect with your HRIS team to coordinate sending this enrollment file to Alerus no later than one month before your plan year begins. Format your open enrollment file using the following file naming convention: “CompanyCode_PT_EN_DATE_OE”.

Employer File: You can upload an employer demographic/enrollment file through your Employer Website. Visit Importing Files for instructions on this process.
DIRECT ENROLLMENT ENTRY
You may enter your enrollments one at a time directly through the Employees section of your Employer Website. Visit Manual Enrollment Entry for instructions on this process.

Do not submit enrollment termination dates for active participants to Alerus as of the plan year’s end, either through file integration or the employer website. Doing so will cause issues with your benefit programs. Alerus automatically tracks the end of your plan year for claim eligibility.

New plan year participants who have not previously had Alerus access will not have online access until the first day of the plan year. For example, if you enter a new participant enrollment for January 1st in December, that participant will not be able to access their account until January 1st.

DEPENDENT ENROLLMENTS
Dependent Enrollment information can be submitted to Alerus:

ENROLLMENT FILE
File Feed: If you have a secure file feed established between your HRIS system and Alerus, the dependent enrollment information may be able to be submitted through your file feed. You will need to connect with your HRIS team to see if you have the dependent enrollment information enabled on your file feed.
DIRECT DEPENDENT ENTRY
You may enter the dependent information for each participant directly through your Employer Website by navigating to the Employee Page>View Profile>Dependents>New Dependent.

To ensure the accuracy of claims payments, Alerus requires plan sponsors to provide covered spouse and dependent data for all participants in the HRA so the information can be verified when claims are substantiated. Dependent enrollments with Alerus should match the dependent enrollments for your group health plan.

Though participants may still be able to enter and update dependent information on the website, only dependents submitted by the employer will be linked to the participant’s HRA coverage and plan. This ensures claims are only reimbursed for family members covered under the employer’s group medical plan, as verified by the plan sponsor (employer).

Dependent enrollment information will be required to be maintained by the employer.

Medicare Secondary Payer Reporting

All HRAs are now required to comply with Medicare Secondary Payer (Section 111) reporting. Complete your HRA Medicare Reporting Form found in the Employer Website under Tools>Resources and submit it through your Employer Website – Requests>New Request no later than one month before the beginning of your plan year.

Alerus Health Benefits Card

Participants with a current Alerus Health Benefits card will keep the same card for the new plan year. New cards for those scheduled to expire will be mailed approximately 30-60 days before expiration.

Debit cards for new participants will be mailed according to when the new plan year enrollments are received.

Submit the Debit Card Copay Template to ensure your health plan copays are set up correctly on your debit cards.

HRA and HSA Benefits

For an HRA plan to not prevent eligibility with a Health Savings Account (HSA), the HRA plan must meet minimum plan deductible requirements. See these deductible requirements on our Plan Limits Resource Center.

Summary of Benefits and Coverage (SBC) for Your HRA

Since your HRA is considered a self-funded group health plan, you are required to distribute an SBC to all eligible employees. Alerus can create an SBC for your new HRA plan year benefit. The fee to create an SBC is $50 per SBC requested. Please contact Alerus if you wish to have us create one for you.

Enrollment Verification

Enrollment verification is required to ensure accurate benefit enrollment. After the plan year enrollments have been processed, you are required to verify plan year enrollment by generating HSA Account Detail Report through your Employer Website – Reports>New Report>HSA Account Detail Report.

For the HSA Account Detail Report the specifications will need to be changed to the below listing:

Time: Enter specific date range
Group By: Division
Type: Detail
Options:
- Email me when the report is available.
  - Reporting Period Data

Plan Upgrades to Consider

Participant/Dependent File Feed: Alerus can accept a file feed from your HRIS or payroll system to automatically send demographic, enrollment, dependent, or contribution benefit information to Alerus, eliminating the need to manually update participant information within our systems. Reach out to our team at health_benefits_client_support@alerus.com if you are interested in integrating a file feed with Alerus.
Claim Reimbursement Schedule: Alerus offers daily or weekly claims processing. If you would like to change your claim reimbursement schedule, contact Alerus at health_benefits_client_support@alerus.com.
Claim File Feed: Alerus accepts a claim file feed from your insurance carriers that will send claim information from your health plan to Alerus to either be automatically filed on the participant’s account or to automatically substantiate debit card transactions. Your insurance carrier may charge a fee to set up this file feed. If you are interested in setting up this claim file, contact Alerus at health_benefits_client_support@alerus.com.