When you think about your business you probably envision its growth, scalability, and overall success. After all, who wouldn’t? And one of the ways you scale your company is by continuing to grow in terms of the number of employees you hire.

Having a great benefits package along with compensation and office culture can be just what a prospect needs to work hard for your company. When selecting what goes into that benefits and insurance package, we want to ensure you can sidestep any and all mistakes. First off…

Know Your Options

The first big mistake is not knowing or analyzing all of your available options. Mainly, low or high deductible plans. Low deductible plans save employees the most money, while high deductible plans save you as the employer the most money. However, there are some things such as HRAs that you can implement to offset the costs of high deductible plans. But as they say, everything in moderation. Or in this case, in balance. Essentially, don’t make your decision for a plan based solely on the price.

Which brings me to my next point: ensuring you have the right broker working for you. You and your employees work as a team, and your broker should work like that for you, too. Brokers like Decisely focus on customer service and strategic partnerships. Mostly so that you can tailor your coverage to suit your workforce best.

For example, if your business is primarily a small group with dependents (i.e. children), it might be great to offer a wide range of benefits, but not so great if your business is made up of employees that spend their time traveling for work. Having a broker that understands these needs and understands your business means you can offer what is best to retain your employees.

Have Benefits Plan Documents

Benefit plan documents. Yes, they are necessary. More than necessary. It’s the law. For benefit plans, group health plans, the works. But it’s not as scary as it sounds. It’s simply having the legal documents in place that specify the benefit offerings and provisions behind the plans. Again, a broker can also help you here.

Similarly, it is equally important to have a Summary of Plan Description. Similarly, it is an outline of the plans offered, and should be updated at all times. This summary should be given to all employees that are participants in your healthcare offerings.

Let Employees Know about Plan Changes

This directly links to having plan documents available for your employees. If you decide to change your plan or eligibility criteria, be sure to let your employees know. No one wants to be left in the dark, after all.

One of the items that must be provided to coverage participants is called a Summary of Benefits and Coverage. This should be provided to employees before they enroll in a plan, when the plan renews, within 90 days of a special enrollment period, and within 7 business days of if an employee submits a written request.

An additional document is the Summary of Material Modification, which is supplemented when a plan changes outside of a renewal period.

No Sharing Allowed

One last mistake that some companies slip up on is the sharing of employee information. When doing your research to get price quotes for health plans, health providers only need ages, gender, zip codes, and the family makeup of your employees. No names, social security numbers, or addresses required – so keep that info safe.

This goes hand-in-hand with taking the necessary time to “shop” for the right insurance providers. And if all else fails, remember that synonym we all saw on posters in our elementary school: A.S.K. – always seek knowledge. The more you know, the better decision you can make for your business.

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Understanding these mistakes and what you can do to avoid them will not only help you, but also your employees. Most of all, it will attract and retain the highest quality talent to help you attain that vision we talked about: growth, scalability, success.