Over the last two months, PAGE has been hearing from many of our members upset about not being able to log into the State Health Benefit Plan (SHBP) website on the last day of open enrollment due to technical difficulties.  Because of the technical difficulties these members were unable to answer required questions about tobacco usage.   Therefore, some educators are being charged this tobacco surcharge even though they are non-tobacco users.  In addition, some educators were confused and thought that since they had answered during the last open enrollment that they were not tobacco users that they did not have to go back in and answer it again.  In fact, failure to answer this question again resulted in the default of being assessed the tobacco surcharge.

After the many complaints from educators across the state, effective immediately, the State Health Benefit Plan (SHBP) is implementing a policy for non-tobacco users who wish to have the tobacco surcharge removed.   Please go to the link below to get more information on this new policy and steps you must take to have this surcharge removed.

 http://dch.georgia.gov/00/article/0,2086,31446711_31450193_48339331,00.html