Key Findings

Market Trends and Outlook

• It is an increasingly common practice in Poland for companies to offer private healthcare coverage to their employees due to great inefficiencies in the public healthcare system.
  • - "Since public healthcare is very poor in Poland, it is a standard practice for companies to offer private healthcare coverage. It is part of the benefits package offered to the employees."
  • - HR Director, ACS Poland - Xerox Group
    
    
  • - "The second reason is to take care of the health of our employees because we are checking their absenteeism on a regular basis. We can now see that, after the introduction of the additional healthcare, we have significantly reduced the absenteeism rate in our company."
  • - Senior HR Director, Uralita
    
    
  • - "State insurance is not very good, especially when trying to visit specialist doctors. Therefore, employees like to have additional healthcare and will stay with companies that provide it in order to avoid the struggle of State healthcare."
  • - HR Director, Imperial Tobacco
    
    
• In Poland, it is required by law to offer a minimum level of coverage to all, which includes only mandatory check-ups. Companies do offer supplementary healthcare, but employees have to pay additional taxes on it.
  • - "We have basic coverage required by law for our sales force - they benefit from compulsory health check-ups every 2 or 3 years."
  • - HR Director, Imperial Tobacco
    
    
  • - "Employees have to pay additional taxes on the private healthcare insurance plan they receive. Due to a regulation in Poland implemented around 2 years ago, this kind of service (the additional healthcare) is treated as an additional income or remuneration of the employee, which means that each employee has to pay the tax deducted from this amount towards what we pay as a company."
  • - Senior HR Director, Uralita
    
    
• Private healthcare insurance, which goes beyond the minimal coverage required by law, is mostly considered a basic benefit and is offered in a majority of cases to all employees.
  • - "Healthcare coverage is for everyone, so it is a basic benefit."
  • - HR Director, Avon Cosmetics
    
    
  • - "I think it is basic because all of the companies in this sector offer it and we offer it to all employees."
  • - HR Director, Oracle
    
    
  • - "It is an additional benefit in the sense that we are not required by law to offer it. It is a basic benefit in the sense that it has become standard in the industry and we have to offer it if we want to have a good labor force. We offer it to everyone, so it is a basic benefit."
  • - HR Director, Credit Agricole - CIB
    
    
• The general trend is to increasingly cover all employees with at least a basic healthcare insurance. If not all employees were covered previously, the number of employees covered has increased; otherwise it has increased only insofar as the company has grown in size.
  • - "If we compare it to the past 5 years, the number has increased. Before it was a group of 30-40 people. Now it's the whole company, so 160 people."
  • - Senior HR Director, Uralita
    
    
  • - "Since we have grown as a company- it has increased. I would say it has increased by 10% in total."
  • - HR Director, Oracle
    
    
  • - "It has remained constant. We have always covered all of our employees and the size of our firm has been the same for the last 15 years."
  • - HR Director, Credit Agricole - CIB
    
    
• The breadth of coverage depends on the general practices in a particular industry and the costs involved. Given the budget, companies do use healthcare packages to attract and retain talent.
  • - "It is mainly driven by the competition in the employer's market. However, it is limited by the size and the financial conditions of the company."
  • - HR Director, ACS Poland - Xerox Group
    
    
  • - "We see what is going on in our competitive companies and then we build up a plan to be at least over the median. It becomes part of our regular budget process."
  • - HR Director, Credit Agricole - CIB
    
    
  • - "We look at our key competitor companies to see what kind of medical care they have and we do a similar thing. The cost is also taken into consideration..."
  • - HR Director, Oracle
    
    
• For higher managerial positions as well as in the industries in which it is more difficult to attract talent, companies tend to offer more extensive packages.
  • - "We have a basic plan which covers primary and outpatient care. For the managers, we provide a higher level of insurance"
  • - Senior HR Director, Uralita
    
    
  • - "We have three programs for the three groups: staff level, managers, and executives. I think this is a standard practice in Poland. I do believe that people in higher-level positions deserve better healthcare benefits"
  • - HR Manager, Panasonic
    
    
  • - "There are two options: a lower option for employees and a higher one for managers. Differentiation is very visible according to the supplier offer. For example, the gold package would be for managers and silver would be for others. The difference between the pricing of these packages is about 50%."
  • - HR Director, ACS Poland - Xerox Group
  • - "Increasingly, I notice that companies use medical healthcare insurance as a way not only to attract better talent, but also to motivate and retain employees. For example, many companies differentiate and offer better and more extensive packages with the progression of the career."
  • - HR Director, Thales
    
    
• Companies negotiate contracts and thus prices individually. Prices are lower for the firms with a higher number of employees covered. Furthermore, it appears that companies, which have a long working relationship with a particular provider, have higher bargaining power.
  
  
  • - "Each company negotiates prices separately with the provider."
  • - Senior HR Director, Uralita
    
    
  • - ".the price of the insurance drops dramatically with the increase of the number of employees covered. We are a small firm with only 70 - 80 employees and, therefore, insurance price negotiations are very difficult for us."
  • - HR Director, Credit Agricole - CIB
    
    
  • - "However, given the long term experience with our current provider, we have higher bargaining power and can therefore negotiate a better deal with them."
  • - HR Director, Thales
• As specified in the contract, companies experience an increase in price every six months, which corresponds to the rate of inflation. However, due to generally unfavorable economic conditions and increased competition, no real price increases have been observed overall. This trend is expected to continue with possibly decreasing prices in the future.
  • - "Every six months, we have an increase in the cost of the package in line with the CPI of the past six months."
  • - HR Director, Thales
    
    
  • - "I think it has increased alongside inflation. In 2011, it increased by around 4.5%"
  • - HR Director, Oracle
    
    
  • - "Due to the economic situation, which is not that good after the crisis, I cannot imagine any provider daring to increase their pricing. All companies are negotiating their prices down, which...