The Bluecross Blueshield of South Carolina building in Columbia.
The federal government decided to keep a health care contract with a BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina subsidiary, and that means 950 jobs will stay in the state, 700 of them in our area.
The Government Accountability Office upheld the award of a U.S. Military TRICARE contract to Humana Military Healthcare Services.
TRICARE is the military's health care program for active-duty and retired service members and their families.
PGBA, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of S.C. BlueCross, provides services like claims processing and customer service for Humana, and the contract means 700 PGBA employees in Florence, 75 employees in Camden, and 175 employees in Columbia will keep their jobs.
The contract has a potential value of $23.5 billion which will go to the prime contractor, but PGBA will get a significant portion of that.
"This is a great day," said BlueCross President and CEO David Pankau. "It not only saves jobs but contributes to the economic development of many of our South Carolina communities and elevates our state's workforce. We are able to successfully partner and retain these contracts because of our total enterprise's technology, our scale, our ability to manage multiple types of business, and an excellent work force. Most people don't realize that we are much more than a commercial health insurance company."
The contract was originally awarded on July 13, 2009, to a competing bidder. Humana Military lodged an appeal on July 22, 2009, with the GAO. That protest was sustained on Oct. 28, 2009. The contract was subsequently awarded www.tricare.mil/pressroom/news.aspx?fid=695 to Humana Military on Feb. 25, 2011. The competing bidder filed a protest on March 7, 2011, which was denied by the GAO on June 14, 2011.
The new contract is scheduled to begin on April 1, 2012, and provides for five one-year options annual exercisable by the Department of Defense. www.defense.gov/
"I want to express my deep appreciation to our South Carolina employees for continuing their outstanding performance," said Michael J. Skarupa, president and chief operating officer of PGBA. "Even during this long period of uncertainty, they made sure the beneficiaries and health care providers in the TRICARE program continued to receive the quality service they have come to expect from PGBA. We are honored to serve our nation's military."
PGBA handles approximately 60 percent of the nation's TRICARE medical claims processing and related customer service, serving more than 6 million beneficiaries and their health care providers. PGBA has offices in Columbia, Florence, Camden and Surfside Beach, S.C. In addition to TRICARE, PGBA is also a claims processor for several other government programs throughout the United States.
Founded nearly 65 years ago to provide health plans to South Carolinians, S.C. BlueCross began to diversify into other business lines 40 years ago, enabling the corporation to generate many more jobs in the state. Just over the last two decades, BlueCross has grown from a group of a few companies with 3,000 employees to an organization of more than 45 companies with more than 12,000 employees. A total of 8,500 employees are working in South Carolina and another 3,500 working in other states. Of the 9,000 jobs added over the last 20 years, more than 80 percent work outside of the commercial insurance division.
