An investor deposited $1,000 in an interest-bearing account today. That sum will accumulate to $1,200 two years from now. One true statement about this transaction is that:
A health plan may experience negative working capital whenever healthcare expenses generated by plan members exceed the premium income the health plan receives.
Ways in which a health plan can manage the volatility in claims payments, and therefore reduce the risk of negative working capital, include:
Accurately estimating incurred but not reported (IBNR) claims
Using capitation contracts for provider reimbursement
The Amethyst Health Plan uses a budgeting approach that requires each line of business within Amethyst's operation to justify its continued operation. Amethyst begins with the premise that no resources will be allocated for the following period unless each dollar to be spent is justified and is shown to be within departmental plans and corporate goals and objectives. The budgeting approach used by Amethyst is known as:
For a given healthcare product, the Magnolia Health Plan has a premium of $80 PMPM and a unit variable cost of $30 PMPM. Fixed costs for this product are $30,000 per month. Magnolia can correctly calculate the break-even point for this product to be:
Costs that can be defined by behavior are most commonly classified as fixed costs, variable costs and semi-variable costs. Examples of fixed costs include: