5 U.S.C. § 8909 — Employees Health Benefits Fund

(a) The Fund exists in the U.S. Treasury and is run by OPM. It holds all the contributions from enrollees and the government described in section 8906. It can pay approved health plans with no yearly limit, and pay administrative costs within limits Congress sets each year — except money set aside under (b)(2), which is not subject to that yearly limit. When the Fund pays a plan that uses a "letter-of-credit" payment setup, it must, as much as practical, pay only when the plan has actually presented checks, following Treasury Department rules.

(b) OPM must regularly set aside parts of the contributions:
(1) A percentage — no more than 1% of all contributions — that OPM decides is enough to cover administrative costs.
(2) In fiscal year 2026, exactly $66,000,000, available through the end of fiscal year 2035, so OPM's Director can carry out parts (c) through (f) of the FEHB Protection Act of 2025.
(3) For each health plan, a percentage — no more than 3% of that plan's contributions — that OPM decides is enough for a contingency (backup) reserve. OPM may also move unused administrative money into these plan reserves; each plan's reserve then gets credited based on how much that plan was paid in the previous contract term. Any dividends, rate adjustments, or refunds from a plan go into that plan's reserve. Reserves can be used to soften future rate increases, lower what enrollees and the government pay, or increase benefits — OPM decides how.

(c) The Treasury Secretary may invest Fund money in interest-paying U.S. government securities and sell them when needed; the interest and sale proceeds go back into the Fund.

(d) If employee organizations that sponsor health plans merge, the merged plan's assets (including reserves) and debts transfer to the new combined organization's plan, starting the next contract term after the merger. People covered under the old plans — employees, annuitants, former spouses, and others with continued coverage — move to the new plan automatically, unless they choose a different plan. If the surviving organization is the type described in section 8901(8)(B), transferred people cannot stay enrolled past that contract term unless they are full members of that organization.

(e)
(1) Except in a merger under (d), when a plan is discontinued, its contingency reserve is divided among the remaining plans for the next contract term, based on how much each plan was paid during the year the discontinued plan ended.
(2) This division must be finished by the end of the second contract year after the plan is discontinued.
(3) OPM will write rules for how this works if a plan is dropped before it finishes receiving its own full share from an earlier plan's discontinuation.

(f)
(1) No state, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, or any of their local governments may tax, charge a fee to, or otherwise take money — directly or indirectly — from a carrier or subcontractor of an approved health plan because of a payment made from the Fund.
(2) But this does not stop a state or similar government from taxing the net income or profit a carrier or subcontractor earns from this business, as long as that kind of tax applies broadly to many kinds of business, not just this one.

(g) The Fund can also pay costs OPM has for running the demonstration project described in section 1108 of title 10.