29 Jun Losing Sleep Over Benefits Technology? Get Over It!
Posted at 08:03h
in Benefits Administration, ClearPath blog, Employee Benefits, Employee Communication, employers, Helpful Tips, HR, Know Your Benefits, Technology
Are you having a hard time figuring out all the different technologies associated with your benefits program? Read this great article by Linda Keller from SHRM on how to navigate through the different technologies associated with your employee benefits program.
It’s easy to get caught up wanting to deliver a sophisticated platform to engage your workforce. Many benefits technology solutions promise to make employees smarter consumers of health care through slick recommendation engines, bots, and avatars delivered on smart phones.
I advise you to keep these three things in mind when you evaluate benefits technology:
1. Technology won’t solve your millennial dilemma.
Right now Millenials make up the largest portion of the workforce. HR professionals are scrambling to figure out how to best communicate and educate them about benefits. The fact is Millennials rely heavily on their parents — not technology — to make insurance decisions. When the Affordable Care Act changed the benefits landscape by allowing kids to stay on their parents’ plan until age 26, it meant that these new workers didn’t have to take an active role in managing their benefits. They just deferred to their parents. HR needs to figure out how to appropriately involve parents in the benefits decision-making process, while ensuring they meet Millennial’s growing demand for non-traditional benefits. Some solutions may include call center support where questions can be answered prior to enrollment.
2. Technology is necessary to reduce compliance risk.
Labor laws are complex and fluid. The future of ACA and its unpopular reporting requirements are unclear. I believe what is clear is that federal, state and local compliance requirements will continue to be a burden and risk for HR. Compliance falls on HR shoulders and the importance of well-kept records is crucial to avoiding fines and penalties. I advise beginning by automating processes that are currently manual and present the highest risk to your organization. If you continue to rely on manual processes for compliance, the odds of success are not in your favor.
3. Technology is not a strategy.
Employers will waste a lot of money on benefits technology if they don’t know what they want to do with it. Develop a clear strategy and roadmap first — then consider how technology can enable your strategy. Determine your cost management and employee engagement goals and then figure out how benefits technology can help drive down administrative cost, create enrollment efficiencies and enhance communication and reporting.
See the original article Here.
Source:
Keller L. (2017 May 23). Losing sleep over benefits technology? get over it! [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://blog.shrm.org/blog/losing-sleep-over-benefits-technology-get-over-it