nyse wcg founded tampa florida 1985 headquarters tampa florida united states key people ken burdick ceo david gallitano executive chairman services healthcare website http www.wellcare.com wellcare health plans inc. began operations in 1985 and is based in tampa florida . wellcare provides medicare and medicaid managed care health plans for over 4 million members partners with over 91 000 physicians and employs over 6 000 associates . wellcare health plans inc. is the holding company for several subsidiaries including wellcare staywell healthease harmony and ohana . regional offices are located in miami florida ; manhattan new york ; new haven connecticut ; baton rouge louisiana ; marietta georgia ; houston texas ; and chicago illinois . 1 contents 1 history 2 acquisitions 3 benefits assessment 4 analyst coverage 5 references 6 external links history edit wellcare began operations in 1985 in tampa fl as a medicaid provider for the state of florida . with the passage of the balanced budget act of 1997 wellcare began offering medicare beneficiaries private health insurance plans . these programs were known as medicare choice or part c plans . in 2003 wellcare began offering medicare advantage plans with prescription drug benefits after the signing of the medicare prescription drug improvement and modernization act . in 2006 wellcare began offering medicare medicare part d plans and has since become one of the top 10 part d insurance providers by membership volume for these types of plans . on october 24 2007 law enforcement agents from the federal bureau of investigation department of health and human services and the florida attorney general s medicaid fraud control unit executed a search warrant on the premises of wellcare health plans headquarters in tampa fl . trading on wellcare s stock was halted on the news but subsequently fell as low as 80 % below the 52 week high . 2 the u.s. securities and exchange commission sec has wellcare s financials under watch and several class action lawsuits were launched against wellcare on behalf of shareholders . wellcare has said that its normal business operations have not been affected by the federal and state investigations and that it remains financially sound with over 1 billion in cash and cash equivalents . citation needed in a now unsealed plea agreement prosecutors and a former employee said the company inflated expenditures by submitting fake documents to the state . under some mental health care contracts wellcare was paid a flat per patient fee and required to spend at least 80 percent of it on care . any leftover amount beyond 20 percent was to be repaid to the state but the bogus expenditures allowed wellcare to keep that surplus . wellcare agreed in august to repay 35 million its best estimate of the total wrongly kept from 2002 2006 . after the raid the company restated its quarterly and annual profits driving down net income by 32 million and saw its top three executives resign . no criminal charges have been announced against wellcare or its officials but investigations by florida connecticut and federal prosecutors are ongoing . the securities and exchange commission is leading an informal investigation and wellcare faces numerous shareholder lawsuits and sealed whistleblower complaints the company s sec filings say . wellcare has since halted all florida campaign contributions . 3 in the nearly 10 years following the fbi raid wellcare has instated numerous trainings practices and ethical standards to maintain vertical transparency and ensure that the highest of standards are upheld even where the law lacks in order to place emphasis on the members and their care . the public perception of the company lingers in the past but the reality is that wellcare and it s associates are not those of 2007 . acquisitions edit since late 2012 wellcare has acquired many smaller medicare & medicaid supplement providers that has significantly expanded the company s national coverage areas november 2012 easy choice health plan in california 4 february 2013 unitedhealthcare s medicaid business in south carolina 5 april 2013 missouri care incorporated 6 september 2013 purchase of windsor health group primarily in mississippi tennessee arkansas and south carolina was announced anticipated to be completed in fq4 2013 . 7 benefits assessment edit on november 16 2007 healthmetrix research selected wellcare as a 2008 senior choice gold award recipient for its medicare advantage benefits plan . recipients were selected from over 200 medicare managed care plans based on cost sharing comparisons including out of pocket costs in the areas of co payments deductibles and premiums . healthmetrix research inc. a national independent managed care research firm conducted its comparisons in over 120 cities across the united states in october 2007 . medicare advantage plans were compared based on out of pocket costs for beneficiaries based on health status categories and corresponding utilization of the most common plan benefits such as physician office visits emergency or urgent care hospital care prevention care and prescriptions . the comparisons identified the medicare plans with the lowest and highest estimated annual out of pocket costs based on the approved 2008 member co payments deductibles and premiums that appear in the medicare options compare database . 8 healthmetrix research awarded wellcare best overall value in the design of its 2008 medical and prescription drug benefits for seniors in the following 21 markets fort lauderdale florida savannah georgia essex county new jersey hudson county new jersey passaic county new jersey union county new jersey buffalo new york rochester new york akron canton ohio cincinnati ohio cleveland ohio columbus ohio champaign urbana illinois chicago illinois fort wayne indiana indianapolis indiana south bend indiana baton rouge louisiana new orleans louisiana fort worth texas san antonio texas analyst coverage edit see yahoo analyst coverage fidel scott deutsche bank mcdonald carl oppenheimer & co. nersessian gregory credit suisse first boston borsch matthew goldman sachs references edit wcg sec filings for wellcare healthplans yahoo finance http money.cnn.com news newsfeeds articles newstex ibd 0001 20512036 . htm travis reed associated press writer ap in medicaid reform fla. gop saw rich benefit the chicago tribune february 14 2009 http www.reuters.com article 2012 11 12 idus118027 12 nov 2012 hug20121112 http www.marketwatch.com story wellcare completes acquisition of south carolina medicaid plan 2013 02 04 http www.marketwatch.com story wellcare completes acquisition of missouri care incorporated 2013 04 01 http finance.yahoo.com news wellcare acquire windsor health group 130101020.html medicare news watch health plans cost comparisons drug cards external links edit corporate web site cms official web site at cms.hhs.gov medicare is signed into law page from ssa.gov material about the bill signing ceremony historical background and development of social security from ssa.gov includes information about medicare detailed chronology of ssa from ssa.gov includes information about medicare early medicare poster from ssa.gov retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title wellcare & oldid 699572785 categories companies listed on the new york stock exchangehealth care companies of the united statescompanies based in tampa floridahidden categories all articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from december 2014 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage 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