Workers footing more of health costs
As health care costs continue to significantly outpace wages and inflation, an affordability gap is placing increasing pressure on employees and eroding satisfaction with their health plans, according to a survey of employees conducted by Towers Watson, a human resources consultancy with a Stamford office.
Nearly three in four (72 percent) employees said their employer has asked them to pay more for their health care benefits this year, as employer health care costs for active employees are projected to rise 8.2 percent.
Employee satisfaction with health care benefit plans is declining on several fronts: 64 percent of those surveyed said they are satisfied with their health care plans, down from 69 percent in 2007; and only 45 percent are satisfied with the cost of their health care plan today, down from 53 percent in 2007.
“The growing health care affordability gap is a very real problem that employers must consider as they rethink their total rewards program and approach to health care subsidies,” said Ron Fontanetta, a senior health care consultant with Towers Watson, in a prepared statement. “The key to future success is a well-designed plan with creative and meaningful consumer and wellness incentives to slow cost inflation and improve employee health and productivity.”
Three in 10 employees said they would be willing to get smaller compensation increases today if they could ensure lower and more predictable health care cost increases tomorrow.
BBB to alter rating criteria
Citing pressure from Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, the Council of Better Business Bureaus said it would change the rating systems used by its BBB members.
The BBB rating system will no longer give additional points to accredited businesses because of their accredited status, but will continue to issue ratings based on the other 16 ratings factors currently used.
BBB will make available on its website a streamlined process for receiving complaints on BBB sales practices, and will implement procedures for investigating each complaint. BBB will also conduct a review of its process for accrediting businesses, and, as soon as possible, make changes that will apply system-wide while hiring an independent third party to assist it.
“For nearly 100 years, the BBB has stood for public trust, and we are taking these steps to maintain that trust,” said Steve Cox, CEO of the Arlington, Va.-based Council of Better Business Bureaus, in a prepared statement. “Given the feedback, we feel it is our duty to take immediate steps to address the concerns raised, and enhance our ability to help consumers easily and quickly find trustworthy businesses.”
Wachovia brand history next March
Wells Fargo & Co. stated it is on track to convert its Wachovia bank branches in Connecticut and New York to the Wells Fargo brand in March 2011.
Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia in December 2008, picking up nearly 75 branches in Connecticut and about 1,500 employees.
The company is refurbishing branches and replacing ATMs that do not require envelopes for depositing cash or checks; and which offer an 8 p.m. deadline for check deposits with funds available at midnight, meaning deposits can be made after the close of the business day.
Spear to lead insurance department
Gov. M. Jodi Rell appointed Simsbury resident Barbara Spear as acting commissioner of the Connecticut Insurance Department, replacing Thomas Sullivan following his resignation.
Spear is director of consumer services and business regulation, overseeing licensing, market conduct and investigations. She is a graduate of the University of Rhode Island.
FrontPoint yanks plug on hedge funds
Even as it is spun out of JPMorgan Chase & Co., FrontPoint Partners reportedly is shutting down hedge funds focused on health care investments amid an insider-trading probe under which it says it is cooperating with investigators.
Greenwich-based FrontPoint is returning some $1.5 billion to investors, according to Bloomberg News.
Authorities are probing tips a French doctor allegedly furnished multiple hedge funds, with Bloomberg reporting FrontPoint has acknowledged authorities have referenced it in court documents. The company suspended a trader who is accused of insider trading.
RBS Sempra alumni launch Freepoint
Greenwich-based Stone Point Capital L.L.C. reportedly is backing a pair of former Royal Bank of Scotland managers creating a new trading company in Stamford called Freepoint Commodities.
Founders David Messer and Frank Gallipoli previously ran RBS Sempra Commodities, which Royal Bank of Scotland sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co. following the credit crisis. Messer and Gallipoli plan to focus Freepoint”™s trading activities in energy and metals, according to Reuters.
Paycheck Fairness Act bounces
The U.S. Senate voted down the Paycheck Fairness Act, sought by U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd and Rep. Rosa DeLauro.
The act would make it easier for women to pursue gender discrimination lawsuits based on unequal pay. In a prepared statement, DeLauro vowed to reintroduce the bill in the next session.
“This is a matter of basic fairness, of ensuring equal pay for equal work,” DeLauro said. “And it is not just women who are affected by this blatant pay inequity. In these difficult economic times, more and more families are relying on women as breadwinners, and our entire economy is impacted.”
Brynwood flips Richelieu Foods
Greenwich-based Brynwood Partners L.P. sold its stake in Richelieu Foods Inc. to Centerview Partners Holdings L.L.C.
The companies did not disclose deal terms.
Richelieu Foods is based in Randolph, Mass., and has about 650 employees. The company makes pizza and salad dressings for sale to supermarkets under their own brands.
Brynwood acquired the company in 2005, and says it has since doubled sales, including revenue from acquisitions. In 2008, Richelieu Foods acquired Sara Lee Foodservice.
Appeals court remands UTC case
The U.S. Sixth Court of Appeals reversed a lower court”™s ruling and said United Technologies Corp. could be held liable for damages after being found in violation of the False Claims Act over a large jet engine contract in the early 1980s.
Hartford-based UTC and subsidiary Pratt & Whitney had competed with Fairfield-based General Electric Co. for the contract, but subsequently came under federal scrutiny for “having played with its numbers” in the words of the appeals court. While UTC was found liable on that front in 2005, a lower court also ruled the government had not proven it suffered damages. The appeals court remanded that decision to a lower court for recalculation of any damage award.
Wheelock does Texas deal
Greenwich-based Wheelock Street Capital L.L.C. reportedly purchased a 1,540-lot residential development project in central Texas, after partnering with a Houston building company to purchase more than 3,000 parcels in Texas for $15 million.
Bank Midwest had foreclosed on the 1,000-acre Sweetwater project earlier this year, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
Before launching Wheelock Street Capital in 2008, partners Merrick Kleeman and Jonathan Paul previously worked for Starwood Capital Group and Rockpoint Group L.L.C., respectively.
State gets $10 million in TAA benefits
In the fiscal year ending in September 2010, Connecticut received $10 million in federal funding to retrain workers whose jobs were deemed lost to foreign competition ”“ but had among the lowest placement rates in immediately finding jobs for those workers.
In Fairfield County in the past year, the U.S. Employment & Training Administration has certified more than 265 workers for Trade Adjustment Act (TAA) benefits, more than half of them at a Beiersdorf facility in Norwalk.
Benefits under the program can include job training, tax credits for health care, and allowances for relocation or additional commuting costs.
According to ETA data, 45 percent of Connecticut workers in TAA programs found jobs within one quarter after receiving their pink slips, below the national average of 58 percent and ranking the state in the bottom 13 in the nation.
Another Aspetuck indictment
A federal grand jury returned a nine-count indictment against Westport developer William A. Trudeau Jr., 47, whom prosecutors allege participated in a $3.5 million mortgage scheme in Fairfield County.
The indictment alleges that Trudeau was an unnamed principal in both Aspetuck Building & Development and Huntington South Associates L.L.C., the latter of which was a shell company used to pay for personal expenses and fraudulently secure loans. Four people have pleaded guilty in the investigation to date, in which conspirators submitted false mortgage loan applications to financial institutions to obtain mortgages on various properties in Fairfield County in order to develop and sell the properties for profit, and to pay off debts owed to “hard money” lenders from whom they had previously obtained high interest loans.
Marc Fisher foots it over to Greenwich Gateway
Marc Fisher Footwear L.L.C. signed a lease for 44,000 square feet at 777 W. Putnam Ave. in Greenwich, where it was originally based before moving to 5 Greenwich Office Park in 2007.
Marc Fisher Footwear designs women”™s shoes and boots.
It was the second largest lease in Greenwich this year, according to Newmark Knight Frank, who represented property owner Gateway Park Associates L.L.C.
