Investment in a Healthier, Happier Future

One of the most common reasons that parents choose not to seek weight loss treatment for their child is cost. A comprehensive treatment program such as Wellspring requires a variety of talented professionals as well as sophisticated systems, processes and administrators in order to achieve remarkable outcomes each and every year.

A private education is never inexpensive, but is seen as a very worthy investment for families who want the best for their child. At Wellspring, our comprehensive weight loss and behavioral change program is provided in addition to excellent private schooling, adding a lifetime of benefits to parents' investment.

We work to make Wellspring Academies as affordable as possible for our families, including:

Refundable fees of up to $1,000 for attending Family Workshop and completing Continuing Care
Providing a full year of Continuing Care
Health insurance reimbursement
Loans to spread the cost into easy monthly payments
Tax deductions to reduce your taxable income
Flexible Spending Account or Health Savings Account
Wellspring Community Assistance Program - Helping families find the necessary resources to help their child
Supporting creativity to pay for Wellspring Academies

1). Refundable Fees

Wellspring knows that long-term outcomes are the most important measure of a weight loss program's success. Therefore, we offer up to $1,000 in refundable fees for following the parts of the Wellspring Plan shown in our scientific studies to have the greatest effect on long-term weight loss success—participation in our Family Workshops and the year-long Continuing Care Program.

Family Workshop
$300 is refunded for every family that sends at least one family member to participate in a free weekend-long workshop while their child is at school.

Continuing Care
$700 is refunded for successful completion of Wellspring's Continuing Care Program by meeting these requirements:

Student completes 70 out of 90 days of self-monitoring on www.wellspringweightloss.com (at least 3 food items with fat and calories recorded per day) after returning home from Wellspring.
Parent (or student) obtains a medically verified height and weight measurement and provides this form back to Wellspring via mail, fax or email.

2. Providing a full year of Continuing Care

While Wellspring represents a significant investment for families, it's important to remember that tuition includes a full year of our Continuing Care Program.

Wellspring wants your investment in your child to be truly life-changing, and your child's time at our Academies is just the beginning of a substantial lifestyle change. Your child will be much closer to a healthy weight when he or she returns home, but may need ongoing support and guidance in the months following Wellspring to reach his or her goal weight.

Once your child returns home, he or she will have the benefit of a full year of ongoing contact and support from our trained Behavioral Coaches, and online tools to help internalize the skills learned at Wellspring.

Many families think about the cost of tuition in terms of a weekly or monthly cost for the child's time on campus. However, it's more accurate to consider a weekly or monthly cost based on the duration of school, plus the months of Continuing Care.

3. Health insurance reimbursement

Many Wellspring families receive health insurance reimbursement for a significant portion of tuition paid because individual and group cognitive-behavioral therapy sessions are central to the Wellspring program. The clinical component of Wellspring Academies includes a psychological assessment and three cognitive-behavioral counseling sessions per week: one individual and two group sessions (with additional sessions added if necessary).

At the end of each month, your child's Behavioral Coach will send you a statement for that month's therapy sessions. The statement won't be coded for weight loss, but rather for the behavioral issues most commonly diagnosed at Wellspring. Two issues diagnosed frequently are depression and eating disorder.

The typical statement amount is $2,000 for the first month and $1,500 for subsequent months. Families with PPO plans are more likely to receive reimbursement for a portion of the clinical component of the program. Families should not expect full reimbursement, nor should they base their decision to enroll upon such reimbursement.

Because health insurance plans vary greatly, Wellspring cannot guarantee that any portion of a student's tuition will be reimbursed by health insurance providers.

It is important for families to contact Wellspring before calling your insurance provider about insurance coverage. Wellspring can help you navigate a conversation with your insurer to determine your coverage and likely reimbursement.

Questions to Consider in Determining Likely Reimbursement from Health Insurance:

Do you have out-of-network medical and/or mental health benefits?
Is there an additional deductible with either?
Is pre-authorization and/or pre-certification required, and if so, what is required? (Wellspring will use best efforts to ascertain this and, where possible, ensure that treatment is preauthorized.)

Please note:

Individual sessions are billed at a rate of $90 to $135, depending on length (typically one $90 and one $135 session per week).
Group sessions are billed at a rate of $72 per (typically two group sessions per week).
The assessment is billed at a rate of $500 (typically one assessment).

4. Loans to spread the cost into easy monthly payments

Understanding how critical weight loss is to their child's health, many families seek financing in order to split the cost of a Wellspring program into manageable monthly payments that extend beyond the child's stay with us.

While some families choose to refinance their home or borrow money from family members, many others take advantage of a special loan program arranged through our lending partner.

Our financing program is a unique opportunity that helps families secure loans to cover tuition costs and other expenses related to enrolling in Wellspring. Our program accesses over 700 lending organizations, which allows us to bundle financing options from multiple lenders to create a personalized solution for qualified borrowers.

To provide additional support for families, this loan package can include transport services and educational consultant fees.

This loan is not available to the general public, and can only be secured by going through a pre-qualification process. Please call us today at 866.277.0221 so that we can walk you through the loan qualification process.

5. Tax deductions to reduce your taxable income

The IRS implemented a new policy (IRS Ruling 2002-19) stating that "Obesity is medically accepted to be a disease in its own right." For taxpayers, this means that treatment specifically for obesity can now be claimed as a medical deduction following a referral from a physician.

The word "obese" carries a lot of significance socially and emotionally and may be difficult for parents to accept; in medical terms, however, it simply refers to a specific measure of body mass, called the Body Mass Index or BMI.

For more information about the IRS policy regarding obesity treatment, please visit www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc502.html

6. Flexible Spending Account or Health Savings Account

For the same reason that the cost of Wellspring can be deducted for federal tax purposes, families may pay for Wellspring with a medical Flexible Spending Account (FSA) or Health Savings Account (HSA).

If you have a FSA or HSA, you are no doubt aware that it is extremely beneficial for you to use this account for all allowable expenses, as you will be spending pre-tax dollars, thereby significantly reducing the effective expense.
Despite the fact that lodging and food are essential components of the Wellspring program, our reading of the Internal Revenue Code leads us to believe that it would be prudent not to attempt to pay for these components of the Wellspring program with your FSA or HSA. However, the remaining tuition and fees can be paid for with your FSA or HSA.

Because each Wellspring campus has slightly different food and lodging expenses, following submission of your application, please contact Wellspring Start to receive an invoice that breaks out lodging and food from total tuition and fees.

7. Wellspring Community Assistance Program - Helping families find the necessary resources to help their child

The Wellspring Community Assistance Program (WCAP) provides families with a Web site they can use to solicit contributions from members of their family, church or community, for the stated purpose of helping their child.
We do this by helping families create a site at http://pledgie.com, and then providing suggested communications to send to prospective contributors.

All contributions at your site will be applied to Wellspring tuition. Please call 866.277.0221 for more information on the Wellspring Community Assistance Program.

8. Supporting creativity to pay for Wellspring Academies

We recognize that for Wellspring families, nothing is more important than helping their child find a path to health and happiness.

This is why our Wellspring Start department is willing to work hand-in-hand with every family on creative arrangements for tuition payment.

Here are some of the creative solutions we've helped families put in place to ensure their children have received the help they need:

A parent from Montclair, NJ set up automatic withdrawals from her paychecks twice per month.
A student from San Francisco, CA was able to draw on her 401k to cover the cost of 4 months at Wellspring.
A family from Denver, CO was able to pool tax returns to pay for Wellspring.
A mother from San Francisco, CA was able to do an early draw on her yearly bonus and have her company wire funds directly to Wellspring.
A mother from Dallas, TX had $2,500 in FSA that she had forgotten about. She used that as her down payment, had $2K in savings, and borrowed the rest from her parents.
A family from NC sold their 4-wheeler and jet-ski to send their son to camp.
One family from Peoria, IL paid for Wellspring by pooling money from Aunts, Uncles, and Grandparents.
A family from Scottsdale, AZ paid for Wellspring by asking church members for assistance.
A family from San Francisco paid for Wellspring by refinancing their house. They were able to refinance at a lower interest rate and actually lowered their payment at the same time.
A family from Fremont, CA paid for Wellspring by having their Employee Assistance Program pay for the treatment.
A family from Miami, FL paid for Wellspring by borrowing on the equity in their home.
Several families have paid for Wellspring by borrowing from their Credit Union, then repaying a large part of the loan through insurance reimbursement and the tax deduction for obesity treatment.
Most families use multiple sources to pay for Wellspring: paying the deposit and pro-rated first month by credit card, then financing the remainder though their local bank. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, and extended family members are often asked to contribute.

Whether you combine insurance reimbursement and our loan program, take advantage of your Flexible Spending Account, solicit contributions through the Wellspring Community Assistance Program, or simply support your child by attending the Family Workshop and supporting completion of the Continuing Care program (thereby receiving a $1,000 refund), there is a path for you to help your child.

As we know from speaking with thousands of families each year, where there's a will, there's a way.