THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 10, 1995 TAG: 9508100458
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
Virginia officials have approved Trigon Blue Cross Blue Shield's request to offer an HMO plan for Medicaid recipients in Richmond. Trigon's HealthKeepers health maintenance organization is the second such plan approved for Richmond-area Medicaid patients. It is a state program that pays for care for the poor and disabled. To encourage Medicaid recipients to sign up for HealthKeepers, Trigon is offering a range of preventive care services, including free routine medical exams and its ``Baby Benefits'' program for pregnant women. Trigon has run a Medicaid HMO in Newport News since December 1993. State officials eventually plan to require people on Medicaid to join an HMO. HMOs are designed to hold down costs by managing when and how people use medical services. (Associated Press) MCI, News Corp. form joint on-line service
MCI Communications Corp. and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. unveiled an on-line service for consumers and businesses. The joint venture will include the current on-line business of both companies, such as MCI's electronic-mail service, in addition to furthering the relationship established this year between the companies when MCI said it would invest as much as $2 billion in News Corp., the international media company. For MCI, the No. 2 long-distance telephone company, the joint venture represents another effort to expand outside its traditional telephone business. It's also an attempt to profit from the small but fast-growing on-line market. (Bloomberg Business News) Deadline set for Free Press reporters
Detroit Free Press executives say they will begin replacing striking newsroom employees permanently if they are not back on the job by today.
The letter was sent on the 26th day of the strike against the Free Press and The Detroit News. The Newspaper Guild did not immediately issue a formal response, but said it was advising members to throw the letters away, calling it ``nothing more than a pre-planned corporate attempt to intimidate and terrorize their employees into breaking away from their unions.''
Six unions representing 2,500 employees at the newspapers walked out July 13. Issues dividing the Guild and the newspapers include a new merit-pay system and a company plan to allow some newsroom employees to waive overtime. The Teamsters, the largest striking union, oppose Detroit Newspapers' plans to eliminate 59 circulation manager jobs and other major changes to the newspaper distribution system. (AP) ``Chunnel'' travel may be limited
Striking another blow to the money-losing Channel tunnel, French train engineers planned to strike today and stay off the job through a busy holiday weekend, though officials promised 50 percent service.
About 100 engineers running the trains under the English Channel were planning a walkout from midnight Wednesday to 8 a.m. Monday, in the middle of the four-day Assumption holiday weekend and during France's traditional vacation month of August. But Eurostar, the train that travels through the underwater ``Chunnel'', promised nine daily round-trips between Paris and London and 10 on Friday. Travel by Eurostar takes slightly more than three hours between Paris and London. Services also link Brussels with London. (AP) Richfood Holdings report record first quarter
Richfood Holdings Inc. in Richmond reported first quarter net earnings of $6.4 million, or $0.30 per share, for the 12-week period ended July 22, 1995, a 30.8 percent increase over net earnings of $4.9 million, or $0.23 per share, for the comparable prior year quarter.
Sales for the first quarter of fiscal 1996 were $395.8 million, a 33.5% increase over sales of $296.5 million for the first quarter of fiscal 1995.
The Company's principal operating subsidiary, Richfood, Inc., recorded sales of $322.2 million for the first quarter of fiscal 1996, compared with sales at $296.5 million for the first quarter of fiscal 1995. (Staff) BellSouth to drop local company names
The names Southern Bell and South Central Bell are about to be paved over by the information superhighway. Both telephone companies will be renamed BellSouth, the name of their parent corporation.
Southern Bell has been around since 1879, and South Central Bell was spun off in 1968. BellSouth offers local phone service through the subsidiaries in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee. (AP) by CNB