The U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury issued an interim rule that protects the ability of individuals and businesses to keep their current plan while providing important consumer protections that give Americans, rather than insurance companies, control over their own health care.

While the Affordable Care Act requires all health plans to provide important new benefits to consumers, plans that existed on March 23, 2010 are exempt from some new requirements. The “grandfather rule” makes it clear that these plans can continue to contain costs by allowing insurers and employers to make routine adjustments without losing grandfather status. Plans will lose their “grandfather” status if they choose to significantly cut benefits or increase out-of-pocket spending for consumers and consumers in plans that make such changes will gain new consumer protections.

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