Are you Open Enrollment ready?
It’s that time of year again! Open Enrollment season is just around the corner, and as an employer, it’s essential to make sure you are fully prepared. Open Enrollment is a critical period for your employees as they select or make changes to their insurance. This is also an excellent time for you to show your commitment to your employees by introducing new and/or improved benefit offerings!
To ensure a smooth and successful Open Enrollment period, here are 3 things to consider and prepare for.
Plan for over-communication.
It’s easy to get caught up in the logistics of Open Enrollment, but having a solid communication plan is essential to your success. Questions to consider as you plan include:
What do your employees need to be educated on? (Maybe you have an underutilized or new benefit rolling out - what do they need to know?)
What changes are being made to plan offerings?
Is there going to be an increased cost to them? If so, how much?
Who can employees reach out to for questions?
Aim to over-communicate to ensure employees are feeling well informed and ready for the selection process ahead. This will make your life, and theirs, much smoother.
Solicit feedback from your employees.
If time permits, and you have flexibility to make changes to your benefit offerings, ask for feedback from your employees about their benefits package. You can ask things like:
Is there a benefit not offered today that you would take advantage of if we were able to offer it?
What’s your preferred method of learning about your health insurance offerings?
How would you rate our [medical / dental / vision] insurance? Please elaborate on your rating.
What benefit would you rate most valuable? Least valuable?
Let this feedback be guidance on where to focus your efforts and where to spend your extra benefit dollars.
Educating and supporting your team.
Most often, employees have a negative Open Enrollment experience when they feel confused or frustrated by insurance jargon, and don’t know where to turn for support when they have questions. As I mentioned earlier, education will be a main player in creating a positive Open Enrollment experience. What you’ll need to decide is, how will we best educate employees?
Will your broker make a visit to your office for a presentation? Are you small enough where they can meet with employees one-on-one?
Can someone internally present a small slide deck with time at the end for Q&A?
Are a few Slack messages sufficient?
Whatever your approach, make sure employees understand what is being offered to them, and make yourself, or a point person, accessible for questions.
Need help supporting your employees through Open Enrollment? ExpeditionHR is here to help! Reach out to me at amanda@exprhconsulting.com.
