Career Tracks: Four Banks Add Coverage for Live-In Partners

Some big banks are extending employee benefits to live-in partners and adult dependents.

As of Dec. 1, same-sex partners of employees at J.P. Morgan & Co. can be covered by an array of medical, dental, and life insurance benefits under the company's plan.

San Francisco-based Wells Fargo & Co. and BankAmerica Corp. will begin extending medical, dental, and insurance benefits to domestic partners- including those of the opposite sex-and adult dependents of employees in January.

BankBoston Corp. will offer a similar array of medical and dental insurance and other benefits to domestic partners or adult dependents of employees beginning in July.

Executives at the various banks said the new policies reflect a desire to cater to the wants and needs of employees at a time of social transition.

"We are demonstrating an appreciation for the fact that the family is an ever-changing concept," said BankBoston spokeswoman Karen Schwartzman. "A diverse work force needs a flexible benefit plan."

Competition for talented job applicants is a major motivation, said bank benefits executives. Extended benefits plans help banks compete with high- tech companies and large corporations by sweetening overall compensation packages.

J.P. Morgan, which is extending its benefits only to same-sex partners, boasts it is the first firm on Wall Street to make such an offer.

However, banks have not been at the vanguard of this movement. Walt Disney & Co. began offering benefits to same-sex partners of employees two years ago. Many Silicon Valley companies, such as Apple Computer Inc. and Oracle Corp., have offered similar packages since the early 1990s.

"It's becoming an accepted practice," said Robert Burnett, a consultant at Buck Consultants in San Francisco, where an ordinance passed this summer now requires city contractors to offer such benefits to domestic partners and dependents.

BankAmerica and Wells Fargo instituted their plans to comply with the city ordinance, said company spokesmen. But the issue "had been one of considerable debate for a long time," said Robert Wynn at BankAmerica.

Employees at the banks have embraced the new policies, executives said. "The reaction here was very positive," said one J.P. Morgan executive, who asked not to be identified.

The executive, who said he had signed up for the benefits, added that the new policy would have the effect of "leveling the playing field" for colleagues who are involved in committed relationships but who, as members of gay or lesbian couples, could not marry legally.

J.P. Morgan's decision to limit benefits to same-sex partners was based on the idea that heterosexual couples can marry and receive benefits that way.

Morgan's approach is not unusual, said consultants. "There has not been a lot of lobbying by heterosexual couples to get benefits," Mr. Burnett said.

At each of the banks, qualification for the benefits does not require strict legal documentation. An employee must merely provide a document explaining the relationship has been established over six months, is a "life-long commitment," and involves the same emotional and financial obligations shared by married couples.

"We're not going to go around checking up on people," said Barbara Hack, managing director and head of employee relations at J.P. Morgan. "It's an honor system."

Adult dependents of employees qualify by meeting financial standards spelled out by the Internal Revenue Service, bank spokesmen said.

Benefits experts said such plans add little cost to a bank's overall compensation budget, because few employees actually take advantage of the offer. Unlike the Ozzie-and-Harriet couples of the 1950s, many of today's couples, both same-sex and heterosexual, live in dual-income households, where each partner is covered by his or her own employer, consultants said.

The banks contacted said they did not know how many employees had enrolled for such coverage, because insurers generally do not supply that information to an employer. "There is no reporting," Ms. Hack said.

Few other large banks have extended coverage for unmarried partners and other adult dependents, consultants said. NationsBank Corp. in Charlotte, N.C., confirmed that it had not done so. At Citicorp in New York the idea is a source of "lively debate and a subject that is actively looked at," a spokesman said.

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