Let’s face it—no matter how beneficial they are, most employee benefits packages read like a confusing hunk of jargon when you actually try to dig into the details. This is a problem because employee benefits aren’t just perks. A well-designed employee benefits package makes your team healthier and more financially secure. And it helps your business attract and retain coveted top-level talent.
This isn’t a minor problem. If your employees can’t sort through the legal and medical terms in front of them, they may choose a health plan that doesn’t meet their needs, or neglect critical health and wellness programs. And if they do, you might face higher healthcare costs since your benefit plans aren’t fully utilized.
The answer to this very common problem is actually incredibly simple, but sadly underutilized—personalized employee benefit consultations designed to eliminate confusion and help your employees make well-informed decisions.
At Hilb, we’ve invested in and advocated for this service for a while now, but if you haven’t taken advantage yet, this blog can serve as a helpful primer to get you up to speed. Here, we’ll cover:
- Where traditional employee benefits support fall short
- How Hilb’s approach to employee benefits is different
- How personalized consultations work
- Th key benefits of this service for employees and employers
Employee Benefit Open Enrollment: Where Traditional Support Falls Short
Most responsible businesses work hard to get their employees the most robust employee benefits package possible. However, once employees actually sit down to navigate these benefits, they usually don’t receive much support. Some employers might offer a brief orientation or handbook, but typically, employees are left on their own to figure out what health plans, wellness programs, or retirement benefits they should sign up for, highlighting the need for better benefit administration.
For both employees and employers, this lack of guidance can have significant downsides. Without clear explanations, many workers may end up choosing the wrong options or opting out of crucial benefits altogether.
This low engagement has ripple effects for you as an employer. As fewer employees enroll in health and retirement benefits, your business loses negotiating power with providers, leading to higher costs and reduced access to the great benefits you’re fighting to provide.
In the absence of a designated professional consultant, HR departments can also spend hours answering questions about major types of benefits or assisting employees with enrollment—a task that distracts them from more strategic priorities.
The result is needless confusion for your employees and extra work and costs for your organization.
What Makes Hilb’s Approach Different?
When it comes to employee benefits, most brokers only assist with open enrollment. At Hilb, we take it a step further by offering personalized, one-on-one benefits consultations with our expert benefits consultants who help your employees better understand the specific health benefits you offer.
This service covers all the major types of benefits, including health insurance, retirement plans, and wellness programs. Our benefits consultants work with you to develop comprehensive benefits strategies that align with your business goals and employee needs. And whether your business has 10 employees or 2,000, we treat every group with the same level of care and attention. Employees can meet with our specialists in person or virtually, receiving tailored advice in whichever format works best for them.
Better yet, our personalized consultations are built into the products you already offer, meaning they come at no additional cost to you or your employees.
How Personalized Consultations with Benefits Consultants Work
Our personalized employee benefits consultations are designed to be efficient and impactful. Our goal is to educate employees on the full range of benefits available to them, ensuring they can make informed decisions.
Here’s how they work:
Comprehensive Benefits Guidance
During each consultation, we provide clear explanations of all the major types of benefits, including your benefit programs. Understanding these benefits programs is crucial for employees to make the most of their options. This includes all statutory benefits and any supplemental benefits you offer. Your employees will leave our sessions with a better understanding of how to make use of their benefits to solve for their and their families’ specific needs.
Tailored Scheduling for All Your Employees
We cater our sessions to your employees’ schedules and daily work routines. For in-person sessions, our team can meet with 30 to 40 employees a day. For virtual enrollments, employees are assigned 10- to 15-minute time slots, ensuring they have enough time to review their benefits and ask any questions they might have.
Ongoing Support for New Hires
We also continuously monitor for new hires, running monthly reports to identify employees who may still need guidance. Once identified, we proactively contact these employees and find time to meet with them, ensuring maximum employee engagement. This proactive approach helps to engage employees from the start, ensuring they feel supported and informed.
Consistency of Service
Whether you have a few or many employees, everyone receives the same high-quality attention. We don’t prioritize larger groups or just cater to high-level executives—we treat every employee with the same care and attention.
No Added Costs
Our personalized benefits consultations come at no additional cost to your business because we operate on a commission-based model. We get paid through the commissions generated from supplemental benefits employees choose to enroll in—things like disability insurance, voluntary life insurance, and other benefits that enhance their coverage. This means your HR team doesn’t have to worry about budgeting for these services, and all your employees still receive expert, one-on-one guidance on their benefits.
Key Benefits for Employees
Personalized employee benefits consultations empower your employees to take control of their benefits and their future. This personalized support significantly contributes to overall employee wellbeing.
Some key advantages your employees gain are:
Better Understanding of Benefits
Our consultations use real employee benefits examples to help your employees make sense of complex topics and understand each benefits offering. We ensure that employees are well-informed about the various benefits offerings available to them, from health insurance to wellness programs, during open enrollment.
- Health insurance plans – Understanding deductibles, copays, out-of-pocket costs, and coverage options.
- Retirement benefits – Choosing between 401(k) plans, pension plans, and profit-sharing options.
- Disability insurance – Knowing the difference between short-term and long-term coverage.
- Flexible spending accounts (FSAs) and health savings accounts (HSAs) – How to maximize tax savings and healthcare expenses.
- Paid leave policies – Navigating maternity leave, paternity leave, sick leave, and paid time off.
- Wellness programs – How employees can take advantage of mental health resources, stress management programs, and preventative care programs.
- Supplemental benefits – Making informed choices on life insurance, critical illness coverage, and accident insurance.
Informed Decision-Making
Without proper guidance and left to decipher benefit plans on their own, employees often make quick or uninformed decisions, leading to inadequate coverage. Our consultations also cover important topics like the special enrollment period, ensuring employees know when they can make changes to their coverage. Our consultations ensure employees fully understand all their options, including both voluntary perks and legally required benefits like paid sick leave or employer-sponsored health coverage. We explain how qualifying life events can trigger special enrollment periods, allowing employees to adjust their benefits as needed. This guidance helps employees make better financial and healthcare decisions.
Improved Well-Being with Healthcare Benefits
When your employees know how to use their benefits effectively—whether it’s accessing preventative healthcare or leveraging mental health resources—they’re more likely to experience lower stress and better overall health, creating a healthier, happier workforce.
Access to comprehensive healthcare benefits plays a crucial role in maintaining employee health and well-being.
Increased Job Satisfaction
When employees get personalized support and utilize their benefits to the fullest extent, they feel more satisfied with you as an employer. This increased employee satisfaction fosters a positive working environment employees are happy and proud to be a part of.
Key Benefits for Employers
Personalized benefit programs consultations can deliver measurable value for your business.
Here are the key advantages for employers:
Our benefits strategies are designed to align with your business goals and enhance employee satisfaction.
Higher Enrollment Rates During Open Enrollment Period
When employees better understand their health plans, retirement benefits, and other work benefits, they’re more likely to enroll. Understanding the open enrollment period is crucial for maximizing employee participation. Higher participation strengthens your negotiating power with providers, helping you secure better benefits packages at lower costs.
Streamlined HR Operations
Managing open enrollment and answering any lingering questions are time-consuming for HR departments. Effective benefit administration can significantly reduce the workload on HR departments. Our consultations take this burden off your team, allowing them to focus on strategic initiatives instead of fielding complex questions about disability insurance or maternity leave.
Improved Employee Retention and Recruitment
Offering unique employee benefits, like one-on-one consultations, enhances your ability to retain homegrown talent and recruit top-level job seekers. Our consultations help to engage employees, making them feel valued and supported. Employees who feel supported and understand their benefits experience higher job satisfaction, making your company a more attractive place to work.
Better Organizational Performance
Employees who know how to utilize their benefits effectively are healthier, happier, and more engaged. This positively impacts your organization’s overall productivity and performance.
Prioritizing employee wellbeing leads to a more productive and engaged workforce.
Cost Savings
Personalized employee benefits consultations also save your business money. Additionally, tax-free reimbursements for business-related expenses can further reduce costs. When employees understand their health benefits, they actually use the preventative care you’re offering, reducing expensive medical claims and lowering your organization’s healthcare costs. Higher enrollment also improves negotiating power, helping you get better rates on your health benefits.
Additionally, these consultations relieve HR from the administrative burden of managing open enrollment and related employee benefits questions, cutting down on labor costs. And, when employees feel confident in their benefits, retention improves, reducing turnover.
By taking advantage of this program, you’re not just spreading awareness; you’re optimizing resources, lowering expenses, and maximizing the return on your benefits program.
At Hilb, we’ve been working to redefine what it means to support your employees. Our one-on-one employee benefits consultations help employees navigate everything from health insurance to retirement plans to wellness programs, ensuring they can maximize the value of the benefits you offer. And even more incredible, this service comes at no additional cost to you—and could even save you money in the long run.
If you’re ready to take advantage of this incredible support system and give your employees the knowledge they need to make more informed choices, contact Patrick Urso at purso@hilbgroup.com and let’s transform your employee benefits program.