BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    Ó



                                                                     SB 388  


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          Date of Hearing:  July 15, 2015


                        ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS


                                 Jimmy Gomez, Chair


          SB 388  
          (Mitchell) - As Amended July 6, 2015


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          Urgency:  No  State Mandated Local Program:  YesReimbursable:   
          No


          SUMMARY:


          This bill designates the uniform summary of benefits and  
          coverage (SBC) information that must be provided to consumers by  
          health plans and health insurers as a vital document, thereby  








                                                                     SB 388  


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          requiring it to be provided in certain languages other than  
          English.


          FISCAL EFFECT:


          1)Estimated one-time costs of $350,000 (Managed Care Fund) to  
            the Department of Managed Health Care for translation, policy  
            development, and technical assistance to plans regarding  
            issues related to using the templates.



          2)Similar one-time costs for similar activities at the  
            Department of Insurance, as well as $60,000 ongoing to ensure  
            compliance (Insurance Fund).


          COMMENTS:


          1)Purpose. According to the author, the Patient Protection and  
            Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires plans and insurers to  
            provide consumers with an easy to understand SBC to help them  
            evaluate and compare their health insurance options. The SBC  
            includes key features of coverage, such as covered benefits,  
            cost-sharing provisions, and coverage limitations as well as a  
            standard glossary of terms. Unfortunately, federal standards  
            on translating the SBC are inconsistent with California's  
            translation requirements. The author states that this bill  
            makes clear that translation of the SBC must be consistent  
            with California's current language access laws, helping to  
            ensure that more Californians are informed about their health  
            coverage options and have equal access to critical information  
            about their health care.











                                                                     SB 388  


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          2)Background.  A range of federal and state laws and regulations  
            apply to language access for consumer documents produced by a  
            health plan or insurer documents.  Federal law requires  
            carriers to provide enrollees with a uniform SBC, which  
            provides information about covered services, cost sharing, and  
            other key information about the enrollee's health care  
            coverage. Federal law requires the uniform SBC to be  
            translated into non-English languages when 10 percent or more  
            of the population of the enrollees' county speaks that  
            language. Under federal law, only Spanish and Chinese meet the  
            thresholds requiring translation.  State law requires vital  
            documents to be translated into ten languages (Spanish,  
            Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, Tagalog, Russian, Armenian,  
            Khmer, Arabic, and Hmong). 



          Analysis Prepared by:Lisa Murawski / APPR. / (916)  
          319-2081