Federal Employees Health Benefits Program: Optimizing FEHB Plan Offerings

In plan year 2026, the Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) Program offers 132 plan options from 47 carriers, and the Postal Service Health Benefits (PSHB) Program offers 75 options from 17 carriers. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) wants to hear whether that is the right mix.

OPM published a request for information on September 15, 2026. Right now each health plan may offer at most three options, or two options plus a high-deductible health plan (HDHP), under 5 CFR 890.201(b)(3)(i). OPM says changing the number or types of options may help with growing costs, and that what it learns will tell it whether to propose new rules later.

Some background from the notice: FEHB began in 1960 and is the largest employer-sponsored health insurance program in the country, covering about 8.3 million people. A 2010 rule let employee-organization plans and HMOs offer three options without one having to be an HDHP; a 2018 rule extended that to the Service Benefit Plan and the Indemnity Benefit Plan. In OPM’s 2023 Federal Employee Benefits Survey, 90% of respondents called the program’s availability extremely important or important and 94% said it met their needs to a great or moderate extent, but only 66% rated it an excellent or good value.

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Among OPM’s questions: Would enrollees want more, fewer or different options? Would more variety push people toward lower-premium plans? Should there be a premium ceiling above which a plan has to drop an option unless it lowers premiums? What would happen if more options were HDHPs with health savings accounts? Would changes affect employees and retirees differently? Are today’s plan-comparison tools good enough?

Comments are due November 16, 2026, at www.regulations.gov. OPM says submissions are posted as received, without change, including any personal identifiers or contact information. Contact: Meredith Gitangu, Senior Benefits Analyst, (202) 606-2678.

Federal Register filing: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/09/15/2026-18944/federal-employees-health-benefits-program-optimizing-fehb-plan-offerings

This is a Notice Nearby publisher-desk Federal brief — a short in-house summary of a public federal filing. It is not official agency minutes, not a newspaper story, and not Legal Publication. It does not satisfy a statutory notice requirement.