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accomplished the same result by adjusting the employees' benefits
to equal its employer's contributions. The Prime Plan charged
back the employees' claims to their employers' accounts by
carrying the accounts' yearend balances over to future years and
limiting an employee's benefits to the amount in his or her
employer's account. This was an experience-rating arrangement.
Mr. DeWeese concluded that experience-rating may occur by
adjusting benefits, rather than premiums, and Mr. Barnhart
agreed. Mr. Barnhart also acknowledged that the term
"experience-rating" means that, over time, the premiums less
expenses equal the benefits. This credible expert testimony
supports our view that the Prime Plan had experience-rating
arrangements with respect to all participating employers.
We also conclude that the Prime Plan had experience-rating
arrangements because each employer's relationship to the Trust
was more akin to the relationship of an employer to a fund, than
of an insurer to an insured. In the typical setting of a self-
funded welfare benefit plan, an employer contributes to a fund
from which all of its employees' claims are paid; another
employer's employees may not recover amounts from the first
employer's fund. An insurer in the typical insurer/insured
relationship, on the other hand, usually collects premiums from
many employers and pays the claims of each of the employer's
employees. The insurer typically spreads the risk of claims
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