COTABATO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / September 8, 2008) – Seven people were killed Monday, including five children, after government planes blasted a small civilian boat in Maguindanao province in the southern Philippines, where fighting erupted between Moro rebels and military forces, officials said.

The Philippine military insisted those killed in the air strikes were rebels, but Mosib Tan, the municipal administrator of Datu Piang, said the victims were all innocent civilians.

“The hit the wooden boat and five children and their father were killed. Their mother’s body is still missing. Another victim who survived the air strike is now in the hospital – they are all innocent civilians,” Tan told the Mindanao Examiner.

Tan said the planes bombed the boat at the Pawas River in the village of Te.

He identified those who were killed as Daya Manunggal Mandi and his children Aida, 17; Faiza, 1; Bai Lyn, 10; King, 8; and Dayang, 6 and their mother Vilma, whose body has not been found. He said Jamaludil, 17, was wounded in the air strike.

The air strike coincided with the Ramadan, Islam’s holiest month.

There were no immediate statement from provincial or regional government officials, but Tan condemned the military attack, saying, it has displaced more than 700 families from the village. “Our refugee shelters are packed. How can we feed all these poor people who fled their homes,” he said.

Security officials said the fighting broke out after Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels fired on the chopper near the village.

“The MILF rebels attacked our chopper and this triggered the fighting,” Army Lt. Col. Julieto Ando, a spokesman for the 6th Infantry Division, said.

He did not say whether anyone was wounded in the attack on the helicopter or if the aircraft sustained any damage. “We are still awaiting reports about it, but the attack sparked fresh fighting between rebels and our troops,” he said.

The helicopter, Ando said, was transporting troops when it was fired upon by rebels.

Security forces have been pursuing two MILF commanders, Ameril Kato and Abdurahman Macapaar, who were blamed for the series of deadly attacks on civilian villages in Mindanao.

Peace talks between Manila and the MILF were stalled because of the attacks that left dozens of people dead and forced more than 200,000 to flee their homes. The MILF, the country’s largest Muslim rebel group, said it would not surrender Kato and Macapaar despite the government repeated demands.

The rebels threatened to launch a jihad should the government abandons the seven-year old peace talks.

President Gloria Arroyo has already scrapped the Muslim territorial deal that peace negotiators initially signed in July and disbanded the government team talking peace with the MILF because of the rebel attacks.

Arroyo insisted the rebels to lay down their arms before peace talks could resume, but the MILF flatly rejected this, saying, it should settle first the issue on the ancestral domain deal.

The rebels said it would not return to the negotiating table unless Manila honors it commitment to the accord that would grant about four million Muslims their own homeland in more than 700 villages across the troubled, but mineral-rich region on Mindanao.

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With today?s society allowing business to be performed easily with a click of a mouse, it is no wonder the internet has grown to allow the entire world to be connected 24 hours a day. It has allowed many people to quit their jobs, move across the world, and become self-employed. Individuals, who would have normally worked for a company, have now found the pleasures of being their own boss. Technology has opened many new age business practices where email and instant messaging is the preferred source of communication with clients. Becoming your own boss takes self-discipline. The certain luxuries like health insurance and a 401K plan, which we may have taken for granted while working for a corporation; now is an extra added expense which has to be considered.
Things like health insurance which is automatically included in many full time positions, now must be researched, compared, and considered. Usually the monthly cost can be much more expensive since the self-employed individual is now paying the entire bill, not just a small percentage.
What are the options available for a person who chooses to work for themselves?
If the individual was working full time for a corporation, many health insurance companies would offer 18 months of Cobra after leaving the company. The cost for Cobra is 102 percent and the plans coverage stays exactly the same. If you had Cigna as the health insurance provider under their PPO plan, when Cobra begins, all your doctors and benefits do not change. Prices range from $300 a month for an individual through $2000 a month for family coverage.
Self-employment allows deductions to be taken out for health insurance as well. The general rule is the health insurance has to be established through the business; just paying Cobra to continue the coverage does not follow this rule. By taking the full income made and subtracting half for your self-employment taxes, plus taking out any other deductions (IRA), the left over money is the amount you are allowed for health insurance expenses. This can only occur when you are fully paying your own benefits.
Depending on the type of business can lead to different coverage options. For example, freelance writers have different organizations they can join. A benefit of associating with career groups is health insurance companies then offer discount plans to the organization and their members. This would be the first step to research after the Cobra option.
Another option is a discount health plan. Instead of health insurance coverage, the individual has a choice of medical, dental, and vision plans. A monthly fee is paid and certain doctors and practitioners are in the network. This means certain physicians participate in the discount plan and accept the partial payment. The individual is responsible for the remainder of the doctor?s bill.
Other discount plans will have the patient pay the entire bill to the doctor, which is already at a discounted price, and then send a claim form into the company. For example, the doctor?s bill with the discount is $50.00, the patient pays the full amount before leaving the office. The claim form gets sent into the discount health plan by the patient, and two weeks later, a check for $40.00 arrives. The total cost for the one doctor visit was $10.00 out of pocket.
With many of the health insurance options being offered for self-employed workers, prescreening, referrals, and rules pertaining to the amount of visits allowed per year can apply. Researching all the options before deciding on the plan which best suits your individual or family needs is suggested. Websites can give free quotes for the health insurance companies or discount health plans.
If you find making a decision is too difficult with all the options on the internet, there are insurance agents who can help explain the pros and cons of each. Finding an agent who is reputable can be found through referral services or by asking other self-employed businesses.

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What will laid off employees do for their health insurance? Will they take the option for the expensive CO
A plan offered as continuation through Florida state laws? Will the Charlie Crist health plan be a viable option to the CO
A option? It doesnt seem that way per the latest data from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonprofit policy-research group in Washington, D.C., has been looking closely at the Crist plan, says, The new law passed by the Florida Legislature in May, as a way to reduce the states 3.7 million uninsured, is unlikely to work. Commenting on the report, Moran blasted, It was bad enough that Florida rewrote its rules on health insurance coverage that would allow insurance companies to offer low-cost plans with limited benefits, but now, according to Moran, they limited or excluded common insurance benefits like emergency room visits; who wants to buy insurance that excludes emergency room visits.

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KaiserQuotes.com offers free instant quotes online and enrollment assistance for Kaiser Permanente health insurance coverage. Find affordable, low cost individual, family, child, and group health insurance coverage from Kaiser Permanente. KaiserQuotes.com operates as an authorized broker benefits specialist exclusively for Kaiser Permanente in California and Georgia. This web site is owned and maintained by eHealthQuotes which is solely responsible for its content. This site is not maintained by or affiliated directly with Kaiser Permanente, and Kaiser Permanente bears no responsibility for its content. The email addresses and telephone numbers that appear throughout this site belong to eHealthQuotes and cannot be used to contact Kaiser Permanente directly. Authorized broker benefits specialist for Kaiser Permanente: William Hansen California Insurance License # 0719599 Kaiser Permanente ID: 8067.

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Bad does not even begin to describe it. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) issued its quarterly report for the banking industry late last week and it was not a pretty picture. Bank earnings were off a whopping 46% as banks continued to be hit by losses from real estate related problems and worsening credit conditions.. The industry as a whole took over $37 billion in loan loss reserve increases in the quarter. This was over 24% of the industry's operating earnings, compared to just 6% in the same quarter last year. Slightly over half of all FDIC insured financial institutions reported lower earnings for the quarter. For larger banks, those with assets over $10 billion, the percentages were even worse with about 66% of all major banks reporting lower earnings. Four of the largest institutions accounted for over half of the industry earnings decline. They were not named but it is not to hard to figure this includes such stalwarts as Citigroup, Bank of America and Wachovia. The poor operating performance of the industry led to the lowest average return on assets since the fourth quarter of 1991.
Net interest margins at banks fell in the barter as well. 70% of banks had net interest margins lower than the fourth quarter of 2007 and 61% were lower than a year ago. Larger institutions had a slightly better time of it as their funding costs shifted much faster in response to moves by the Fed. Net margins at community banks, which is defined as those with les than $1 billion in assets, reported the lowest net interest margin since 1988! Smaller banks tend to use retail deposits as their core funding source and they reprice much slower than the fed funds borrowings of larger financial intuitions.
Loan quality was simply awful for the banking industry in the first quarter. Total loan charge offs totaled $19.6 billion, an increase of 139%. Charge offs increased in every single loan category. It comes as no surprise that it was real estate and construction lending the showed the highest growth in loan charge offs. The rate that these loans turned bad was surprising however. Home equity lines of credit charge offs increased 614%. Second mortgage charge offs were up over 1000%. First mortgage loans being written off were up 542%. The real winner (loser),however, was construction loans where charge offs rose 1508%. It does not look to get better in the near future as loans over 90 days past due but not yet charged off surged as well. Overall noncurrent loans rose by $26 billion with over 90% of the rise attributed to real estate related loans. 1.75% of all loans were not current the highest level for the industry since 1994.
In spite of the increase in loan loss reserves, the coverage ratio at US banks fell in the quarter. Bad loans increased quicker than banks could reserve against them causing coverage ratios to fall to just $.89 on the dollar of non current loans. This is the lowest ratio in 15 years.
Simply put, it was a disastrous quarter. As mentioned, over half of all banks had lower earnings. 48% cut their dividends and as an industry banks paid out $12 billion less in dividends in the first three months of the year compared to 2007.Over 600 banks paid no dividend at all. Retained earnings fell over 40% as well. All capital ratios showed at least a slight decline. Overall, total equity for all banks fell by better than $12 billion despite several massive capital infusions for larger institutions. 24 banks were added to the problem list, the sixth quarter in a row that the ranks of banks considered troubled by the FDIC has risen. Two banks failed in the quarter but many more expected by the end of the year.
With the foreclosure rate continuing to increase nationally, the next few quarters for the banking industry do not figure to be any better. In addition credit card and auto loans are falling into the noncurrent category at an alarming rate. Loan growth and demand remains slow and it is going to be difficult for banks to earn their way to health until economic conditions improve.
Te full report is available here: http://www4.fdic.gov/qbp/2008mar/qbp.

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Unfortunately, paying for health care these days - whether it's hospital care, group or private health insurance, or durable medical supplies - is a lot like buying a car: You gotta haggle. If you can research and take care of your out-of-pocket expenses prior to surgery, it's possible and wise to negotiate with the hospital and providers for a lower out-of-pocket rate.

For example, say you know you have elective surgery coming up, and you've discussed it with your doctor and agreed on a date. His office already has the paperwork process underway with the insurance company, and you read through your policy and find that it does not cover out-of-network anesthesia. What do you do? You might call the hospital and ask how many in-network anesthesiologists they generally have on hand at the time when you've scheduled your surgery. If you know there's a good chance the person who is going to provide that service is not going to be covered by your policy, this is where the negotiations start.

Today, we have to negotiate these kinds of things, as difficult as that seems in light of any health issue. We also have a growing rate of tiered billing practices, so we can be charged anything from what a provider like Medicaid or Medicare might have to pay, to the price level of an uninsured patient, which might be substantially higher, but since the charges aren't necessarily standardized, there's a lot of room for discussion. Many hospitals charge uninsured individuals a lot more for services so they can make up for costs lost elsewhere in their operations. The point is, from one end of that spectrum to the other, there's a lot of negotiation room. Knowledge is power, especially in this scenario.

Start with reading and digesting your health insurance policy, whether it is group, government provided, or private health insurance. Call your doctor and ask what kinds of surgery-related expenses a patient is generally expected to cover. These may include radiology (x-rays), consultation with out-of-network specialists (whose fees are also negotiable), pathology, and even blood transfusions. Then, starting with the finance department, call the hospital and ask them which service providers operate outside of your network, and get ready for the talks to begin.

Explain what your insurance provider will cover and what you can afford to pay for the rest. Many hospitals today have made their pricing policies transparent and therefore have prices posted to the hospital Web site or readily available for consumer perusal. Keep in mind that the hospitals offering such practices also only guarantee the prices from the date of printing (or publishing); all the same, armed with this information you can at least get a rough idea of the price range you're dealing with.

According to one lawyer at the Texas State Department of Insurance, pricing is not the only thing you can tweak. "You can also talk to your own doctor and see whether he can find other providers at the hospital who wouldn't be out-of-network. If you have one surgery date, but that scheduled time doesn't coincide with the physical presence of in-network providers, but another time does, well, you'd choose a different time, wouldn't you?" He also said to be on the lookout for words like "allowable," "usual," and "customary" in your policy, because those usually signal "points of flexibility," and we could all use a little flexibility with insurance companies and hospitals.

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Many small business owners know that in order for them to be successful they must offer an incentive to recruit employees to work for them. This can be any number of things, but most often it is the benefit of offering group health insurance. While this could be an excellent strategy for your small business to take in order to recruit new employees, there are a few things that you must know first before you dive into selecting a plan. Research group insurance policies thoroughly before choosing one for your company.
A group health insurance plan can be obtained by any small business that has as little as two employees to as many as fifty. There are two ways you can go about supplying the health insurance to your employees; this will mainly be decided by your own budget. Many small businesses that offer group health insurance help contribute towards the cost of the plan. On the other hand if an employee wants to have coverage for their families, the employer might offer to pay the employees premiums and have them pay the premium for their families.
Another aspect of the group health insurance plan will be deciding between managed care or fee-for-service. Managed care plans include Health Maintenance Organization (HMO), Preferred Provider Organization (PPO), or Point of Service plan (POS).
An HMO will significantly reduce the cost that your members will have to pay for medical care as long as they use the providers specified by the HMO. A PPO will not require a referral in order for them to see a specialist. While the PPO is more flexible it will bring higher costs to the per-visit and annual deductibles. The POS plans are basically a combination of the features that you will find in an HMO and PPO. Members get to decide whether to pay a flat fee for offices in the network, or pay a deductible charge to see someone out of network. The fee-for-service plan gives the employee the power to select health care providers themselves. This means that they will have way more flexibility with where they can go for medical assistance.
Adding an appealing Group Health insurance plan to your business could potentially bring you more employees. This is just the basic information about Group Health insurance; there are many options to consider when choosing a plan. Be sure to investigate all options to create the best plan for your employees.

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(The state of Texas part is key). My husband is self employed, the owner of a small consulting business. We will be moving to Texas very soon. Where we live currently, we have BCBS group health insurance. We would like to have BCBS Group health insurance in Texas, too, but I am not finding it. We do not want small business owner health insurance because we get a better rate with group insurance.
Please do jot reply with spam. If you are an agent, that is fine, but please ksep your answer relevant to my specifications.
Thank you for your help.

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FARMERS INSURANCE GROUP® AGENTS AND EMPLOYEES TO MARCH FOR BABIES SUNDAY IN RICHMOND
The money raised will go to help the March of Dimes
RICHMOND, VA (April 24, 2008) - Representing Farmers Insurance Group®, a national sponsor of the March of Dimes, Farmers Insurance agents and employees will walk for healthy babies in the 2008 March of Dimes March for Babies.

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Oh di mama. Do you REALLY believe that your employer can provide a comprehensive health care plan for just over $60 a month ??? Please get real. Even scanty plans cost an employer $600-$800 per month, and probably more in California, due to the higher costs of living there.I suggest that you revaluate the rate sheet you got to insure that it represents your employers actual costs for healthcare.If you DO discover that this represents his true cost, please forward the information to me. I know at least 20,000 corporations who would like to avail themselves of such a rate.(My guess is that your rate sheet showed the value of the increase ONLY, and not the full premium for the coverage.)The following URL provides rates from a broker for CalChoice HealthNet. Your boss isnt getting a deal much different from what is offered here. Read carefully.

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Group Account Executive x 2

An exciting sales opportunity has arisen within a leading healthcover provider. We are currently recruiting for 2 Account Executives to sell employee healthcover benefits to employees within various organisations within a large area of the North of England.

Duties will include:

Working from home, appointment making.
Visiting employees on site to introduce and sell memberships for employee benefits such as health insurance etc
Confirming appointments
Reporting to regional managers to confirm and collect daily information
Ensure all compliance meet FSA levels
Ensure all work is planned and co-ordinated
Using time effectively within geographic areas.
Achieve and exceed targets

The successful candidates must have previous face-to-face sales, coupled with previous telesales experience. Candidates will also be confident, ambitious and target driven and have a current UK driving licence.

Experience within health and/or insurance would be desirable although is not essential - a sales focused approach is!

Salary 16k OTE (1st year - 28k+), Car, Mobile phone and Excellent Benefits

If you are interested in applying or finding out more information about this role, please call Helen Watson on 0151 2363677 or email hwatson@ritzrec.

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If the American people ever allow banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property, until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers occupied. The issuing of money should be taken from the banks and restored to Congress and the people to whom it belongs. - Thomas Jefferson.

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If the American people ever allow banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property, until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers occupied. The issuing of money should be taken from the banks and restored to Congress and the people to whom it belongs. - Thomas Jefferson.

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1. Health Savings Accounts (HSA)
This is a strategy where the employer purchases a wellness program with a large deductible. Typically, these are groupings that are coming from a program with a very low deductible. Since the higher deductible programs are usually much less money, the money saved is used to set into the employee's "Health Savings Account." The money in this account is used by the employee to pay qualified medical expenses. If it's not used, the money axial rotations over to the adjacent year. The money belongs to the employee, even if they go forth the company.
2. Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRA)
This is very similar to the HSA above but a part of the qualified medical disbursals not covered by the insurance is "pledged" by the employer, that is, the employer only passes the money, if there is a part of the measure not paid by the insurance. This would be more than advantageous to the employer since on an HSA the money travels to the employee, whether there are claims or not. The problem with HRAs is that there are very few carriers that offer them right now.
3. Medical Reimbursement Accounts
This is very similar to HRAs above and extremely flexible. It's otherwise known as partial self-funding. Employer purchases a larger deductible and if the employee utilizes up that deductible, the employer pays all or a part of it, depending on how a pre-arranged understanding is written. This travels for other disbursals not paid by the insurance. The thought is that the employer self sees the typically smaller disbursals with their ain cash, (presumably, the nest egg in insurance premium dollars from going to a higher deductible.) The downside to this is that many carriers forbid the usage of this strategy with their plans. It can be very effectual but do certain you utilize an experienced 3rd political party decision maker as there may be some legal and tax certification required. Otherwise known as Section 105.
4. Kaiser.
More and more than groupings are moving to Kaiser. It is typically, benefit for benefit, less money than just about every other plan. Kaiser is disbursement millions on the hereafter and their quality control is promising.
5. Offering Blue Cross and Kaiser side by side. Blue Cross have a new programme where only five employees need to inscribe with Blue Cross. The remainder can be with Kaiser. This is a land breakage chance in flexibility.
6. Blue Cross Elect. Blue Cross have a portfolio called Elect with 16 programs in it comprised of HMOs, PPOs, and an EPO plan. Each of these programs is priced from low insurance premiums up to a much higher premium.
The beauty of this programme is that Blue Cross allows the employer to "define" how much insurance insurance premium they are willing to pay towards an employee's cost. For example, Blue Cross offers a $10, $20, $25, $30, $35, and a $40 copay PPO plan. The $10 program is the most expensive of this group.
After screening all of the insurance premiums for the assorted plans, the employer can establish, arbitrarily, which program they are willing to pay, state the employee only insurance premium for. In this case, let's state it's the $25 copay plan. The employee can purchase the $25 copay program and it doesn't cost them anything. However, if they desire the more than expensive $10 copay plan, the employer would paysheet subtract the difference in insurance premium costs.
Let's say they have got dependants they desire to cover but the employer only desires to pay for the employee only. The employee could take the lesser expensive $40 copay plan, and usage a small spot of the nest egg to assist them with the costs of adding their dependents.
This have been a highly successful programme because it gives the employees a greater number of choices, helping the employees be more than than unequivocal in their costs and needs, and at the same time, allows the employer to more efficiently define their costs.
This information is clip sensitive and can change at anytime. If you have got a inquiry or need more information, delight contact me at mail@thestrategyguide.com.

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