Archived Documents for IBM/Kyndryl

You may have read previous messages to IBM retirees that your IBM / Kyndryl Chapter and the National  Retirees Legislative Network (NRLN) launched an investigation in January into whether there was an injustice  to IBM retirees when IBM changed its healthcare benefit. 

This resulted in retirees only able to apply FHA/HRA  funds if they elected one of two UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage plans. Retirees who have a Medicare  supplement plan (Medigap) no longer have access to FHA/HRA funds to pay their Medigap premium. 

To gain information and comments, IBM retirees where invited to participate in a survey that opened on  February 24 and remains open for participation at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/NRLNIBM

Click here to  access survey results as of April 9. 

Our team which includes Steve Bergeron, Chapter Membership Director, Bill Kadereit, NRLN President and I have been gathering and studying documents that IBM sent to retirees about healthcare coverage. I want to  thank the IBM retirees who have provided documents.  

Steve has been doing an outstanding job of recruiting IBM / Kyndryl retirees to sign-up as Chapter members at  https://nrln.org/email-sign-up. Membership is 551 and growing daily. Steve has also been a big help in  identifying IBM healthcare program documents. 

Individuals who have participated in the survey, who were not already Chapter members, have had their  names and email addresses added to the Chapter’s database. I encourage these individuals to go to the  NRLN sign-up webpage and do a full sign-up that includes your name, email address, home address and IBM /  Kyndryl Retirees Chapter. Your home address is important to have in our database. With your home address  our system will identify your Congressional District. There are times when it is important to ask members to  send an NRLN sample letter to their U.S. Representative and Senators. 

Your contact information will be in a database provided by a highly qualified database service. The database  service, your Chapter and the NRLN will never provide your personal information to anyone. 

On April 8, a letter, including anonymous comments from our survey, was mailed to Arvind Krishna, IBM  Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. After Bill Kadereit and I acknowledged IBM’s outstanding financial  results in the second paragraph the third paragraph stated: (Click here to read the letter.) 

“However, based on an NRLN / Chapter survey of IBM retirees, many now believe IBM executives have lost  IBM’s moral compass and have become indifferent toward its retirees. That is not so good. The appearance  created is that IBM made a callous attempt to coerce retirees into switching from 2022 plan coverage to new  coverage of two new UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage PPO plans effective 1/1/2023.” 

The closing paragraph stated: 

“Finally, as IBM’s CEO, we implore you to learn just how much of the $11.2 billion free cash flow it would take  to allow retirees to exhaust the full amount of their HRA balances over their remaining years. You can  reconsider and restore them. IBM’s storied history of evenhanded employee / retiree relations is a legacy. 

If a response is received from Mr. Krishna or a member of his executive team, I will let you know. 

As you know, on September 7, 2022, IBM entered into separate annuity contracts with Prudential and MetLife to  transfer its pension benefit-paying responsibility for about 100,000 retirees and beneficiaries covered by the IBM  Personal Pension Plan. This action is known as Pension Risk Transfer (or De-risking).

The NRLN is continuing to lobby Congress and is working with a Congressional Committee’s staff to get its  Pension Risk Transfer proposals enacted into law. The primary objective is that group annuity contracts must  be required to purchase reinsurance that is sufficient to provide a replacement annuity of equal value from a  third-party insurer that is independent of the annuity provider and financially capable. We can’t say at this time  whether legislation would apply retroactively to IBM’s Pension Risk Transfer action.