Secretary of the Treasury John P. Snow spoke to a private briefing in Washington October 26th of bankers about the administration’s strong belief that Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) were an excellent vehicle for helping consumers obtain economical healthcare insurance as well as building a cushion towards retirement. 

Official Statement

After the meeting a statement was issued from the Treasury department that said in part:

“Secretary Snow delivered a message on the importance of HSAs as a means of making health care more affordable and accessible to American workers,” says Taylor Griffin, a Treasury Dept. spokesperson. Griffith, who attended the meeting, said that Snow also stressed the importance of the financial service sector’s commitment in helping consumers establish the accounts. “We’ve had great response from the banking community so far,” he adds. “The Secretary hopes we can continue down that path to make [HSAs] more accessible and affordable, and urge the banking community to encourage their growth by communicating the financial benefits of [the accounts] to their customers.” 

The main thrust of the Secretary’s remarks were focused on the need for more venues through which consumers could open and more easily use the custodial accounts that are a significant feature of HSAs.

The Secretary specifically addressed the issue of future reporting requirements for custodians.  He pointed out to the audience that his department’s major thrust was to make this program work and to help custodians get “over the hurdle of concern” vis-à-vis regulatory requirements in the future.  “We are doing everything in our power to help custodians provide the best possible products for consumers,” he added.

The other keynote speaker at the meeting was Roy Ramthun, Special Assistant to The President for Economic Policy and Advisor on HSAs, Ramthun gave a brief outline of HSAs and their history to date and predicted that 2006 would be a milestone year for them.  He pointed out the announcement in the previous two days of Wal-Mart’s movement towards offering an HSA program to its employees and the fact that other large corporations were also moving in that direction.

In his opening remarks, Ramthun detailed how the legislation underlying HSAs was designed to make it relatively easy for banks and other chartered custodial groups to offer accounts to their clients.  In reviewing the legislative agenda for this session of Congress, Ramthun said the administration was seeking to raise the yearly limits on accounts and to offer other inducements to encourage consumers and companies to adopt this form of consumer directed healthcare.

The meeting was co-hosted by Information Strategies, Inc, parent of www.hsafinder.com and BISYS, the financial services provider.