U.S. Office of Personnel Management www.opm.gov - Recruiting, Retaining and Honoring a World-Class Workforce to Serve the American People

Federal Employees Health Benefits Program

Here are your final instructions for typesetting, printing, and distributing your 2005 FEHB brochure.

You and your OPM contract specialist have finished negotiating benefit changes for year 2005 and are working on the text of your 2005 FEHB brochure. When you agree on final brochure text, your OPM contract specialist will email you a copy of the negotiated text. Please review the final text carefully and completely because it is your responsibility to ensure the accuracy of the benefits, limitations and exclusions in the text.

Enclosure 1 is a sample rate page. Use this to set up the back cover of your brochure. Your contract specialist will give you your rates when they are available.

Developing your brochure

1. Enclosure 2 provides additional guidance for typesetting your brochure cover. As soon as you and your OPM contract specialist agree on the brochure text, your contract specialist will email final text to you. After that, you may not change the text on your own.

2. For 2005 brochure templates, go to www.opm.gov/carrier. Please note that the position of the FEHB logo and the OPM logo have been switched for 2005 - the OPM logo should appear in the bottom right corner above the brochure number In addition, the graphic for Director Kay Coles James' signature has changed - in 2005 it contains her middle initial. . The graphics for the OPM and FEHB logos, the scroll & spike, and Director James' signature may be downloaded from www.opm.gov/carrier.

Printing your brochure

3. After the above steps, when you are assured that the brochure is properly typeset and is accurate and complete, you may have the brochure printed. Review Enclosure 3; it includes these printing specifications:

   • Size: 17" x 11" folded to 8 1/2" x 11". Fold may be glued or saddle stitched at manufacturer's option. Single leaves connected with a lip (i.e., binding stub) are not allowed.
   • Ink color: Standard Black
   • Paper color: White
   • Paper type and weight: Offset Book -- sub 40 or 50, Chemical Wood Writing, sub 20
   • Printing: Head to Head
   • Margins: Not less than 0.5" any margin

Distributing your brochures

4. Carefully review Enclosure 3; it has detailed distribution and shipping specifications. Note: Complying with our shipping instructions will help assure that your brochures arrive at their destinations in excellent condition and are accepted by the agencies.

5. Fee-for-service carriers use the Brochure Quantity Form (a sample is included at Enclosure 4A) to determine how many brochures to send and where to send them. Your OPM contract specialist will send you the list in the next few weeks.

   HMO carriers use the Brochure Quantity Form (a sample is included at Enclosure 4B) to determine how many brochures to send. Your OPM contract specialist will send you the completed form in the next few weeks.

   Use the appropriate shipping label (Enclosure 5) to distribute the printed brochures. Print the labels on pink paper. Labels must show how many brochures you are shipping to each location.

6. By October 4, 2004, email your FEHB brochure in both Word format and PDF format to us at anvicom@opm.gov, using an Adobe Acrobat 4.0 compatible file. See Enclosure 6 for details on creating the PDF version of your brochure. Please name the file using your FEHB brochure number located at the bottom right corner of your FEHB brochure cover. For example,

   • Blue Cross and Blue Shield Service Benefit Plan would be numbered 71-005, and
   • Secret Service Benefit Plan would be 72-011, while
   • MD-Individual Practice Association, Inc. would be 73-100.

7. We will post your PDF formatted brochure on our web page before Open Season. Ship your brochures for receipt by October 12, 2004. Send brochures to:

   1. Your OPM contract specialist.

   2. National Computer Systems, which is OPM's annuitant distribution center. Use the Cedar Rapids shipping label.

   3. Federal agencies. Federal agencies' headquarter offices will contact HMOs directly to order brochures and tell you where to send them.

8. You must send a copy of your 2005 brochure to each current FEHB enrollee in your plan and make available a provider directory - the brochures must be received by current FEHB enrollees before Open Season starts on November 8, 2004.

9. We will attach a copy of your printed FEHB brochure as Appendix A to your 2005 FEHB contract.

10. Next summer, when reconciling community-rated plans' rates, our actuaries will use the number on the Brochure Quantities Form that your OPM contract specialist calculates to determine how much we will reimburse for printing costs. This is also the number experience-rated plans may charge against their FEHB contract.

We appreciate your support and cooperation in conducting a successful Open Season. Please call your OPM contract specialist with questions about brochure production and distribution.

Enclosures

1. Sample Rate Sheet
2. Additional Guidance for Typesetting Brochure Cover
3. Printing, Distributing, and Shipping Specifications for FEHB Brochures
4. A Brochure Quantity Form for Fee-for-Service Plans
4. B Special Brochure Shipments for HMOs
5. Shipping Labels (One blank and one pre-addressed)
6. Instructions for Creating PDF Versions of your FEHB Brochure

Download this Letter as a PDF File
Back to Carrier Letters