Employment Resources

With open enrollment season in full swing, now’s the perfect time to evaluate your employee health insurance benefits. Unfortunately, a recent Aflac survey reveals that most employees don’t spend enough time evaluating their benefits packages.

*Two out of five, or 41 percent, of American employees spend under 15 minutes choosing health benefits for the upcoming year.
*Twenty-four percent spend less than five minutes selecting benefits.
*These same employees will research new cars for 10 hours, family vacations for five hours and new computers for four hours.

You owe it to yourself and your future health to invest time in choosing the right health insurance benefits.

Understand Your Benefits

Technical jargon on insurance papers can be confusing, but would you rather wade through it now or miss out on important benefits when you’re sick? Take time now to figure out which procedures are covered, where you can get treatment and how much deductible you’ll owe. Don’t be like 73 percent of employees who don’t understand their health insurance benefits.

Know What’s Changing

Maybe your employer now offers Health Savings Accounts or dental insurance. These benefit changes could help you stay healthy. Unlike 64 percent of employees who don’t take time to understand their benefit changes, you can ask about changes and understand them.

Select Partners for Long-Term Health

Now’s the time to switch coverage options if you want to switch doctors or pharmacies. While you’re inspecting your benefits package, make sure your preferred hospital and lab is covered, too. Your healthcare team partner with you for long-term health, so take time to ensure you can see your preferred partners.

Save Money

When you don’t make a careful decision about your benefits, you could be throwing away $750 a year on wasted premiums and lost benefits, which is what 42 percent of Americans do. Save that money when you invest time in choosing your health benefits.

Choose Premiums You Can Afford

Employers increasingly push rising insurance costs onto employees. By picking and choosing the benefit package options you want, you also select the premium you can afford. A few hours now prevents insurance premiums from straining your family’s budget in the new year.

Although nine out of 10 Americans auto-enroll and keep the same benefits every year, take time to ask your employer or insurance agent questions and verify the exact coverage you want. You’ll be glad you did.

The financial well-being of your employees affects their health, their productivity and your bottom line!

A recent nationwide survey by Purchasing Power, Inc. found that:

• A high percentage of employees suffer significant financial stress. More than one in four workers surveyed (28%) find it hard to meet monthly household expenses and nearly half (44%) have less than $2,000 in emergency savings.
• They bring these concerns to the job. More than four in ten (44%) worry about personal finances during work hours.
• This stress leaves them less engaged at work and reduces productivity. Nearly three in ten employees (29%) deal with personal finances during work hours and almost half of these (46%) average two to three hours a week on money issues.

Purchasing Power Chief Revenue Officer Elizabeth Halkos offers some recommendations to help your workers maintain their engagement and productivity at the office:

1. Help them reduce debt by offering education, either in groups (through webinars or with a live speaker) or individually so that workers can learn about topics such as budgeting, intelligent use of credit and savings programs. A referral to a qualified credit counseling agency can provide a useful follow-up.
2. Give them access to responsible budgeting tools. Offering non-traditional voluntary benefits, such as employee purchase programs ( which allow workers to acquire high-ticket items and educational services on a “forced saving” basis through payroll deduction) can help reduce their financial stress significantly.
3. Encourage employees to participate in retirement programs such as a 401(k) plan. However, before workers do this, advise them to deal with debt and budgeting issues and tuck away a nest egg.

Our Benefits experts stand ready to help you ensure financial peace of mind for your workers. Just give us a call.

Recruitment bonuses can be a powerful tool for growing your workforce. To set an effective price point for employee referral bonuses, consider:

• The cost of using recruiters (up to 25% of the employee’s first-year salary)
• The rate of turnover in the position
• The income generated by the position
• How strong the need is to find the employee
• How much your competitors’ referral programs are paying

Now that you have a referral amount in mind:

• Define the skills, experience, and personality desired on a one-page sheet that employees can use to describe the job opportunity. This reduces the variance in describing the opportunity.
• On a separate sheet, give them a place to fill in follow up contact information for job prospects.
• Consider paying the bonus in installments (for example, 1/6 every 30 days). Make it clear that the total award will be paid only if the new employee works the full six months.
• Some companies include vendors, customers, clients, and others in this process using the same approach. The only caveat here is to watch potential conflicts of interest.

One company that hires predominately customer service reps gives every CSR a stack of business cards so that when they interact with someone who offers good service, they can hand them a card. The back of the card says something to the effect of, “You’ve given me good service today. Our company is always looking for people who can provide good service. If you’re interested, contact us at (123) 456-5678 or go to company.com.” It’s important to provide guidelines for avoiding conflicts of interest. The last thing you want your employees to do is hand those cards out at a client’s office!

Don Phin, Esq. is VP of Strategic Business Solutions at ThinkHR, which helps companies resolve urgent workforce issues, mitigate risk and ensure HR compliance. Phin has more than three decades of experience as an HR expert, published author and speaker, and spent 17 years in employment practices litigation. For more information, visit www.ThinkHR.com.

In a case that illustrates how a supervisor’s ill-advised comments can come back to haunt a company, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently revived a discrimination case by an older employee who had been laid off.

In Sharp v. Aker Plant Services Group, Inc., the plaintiff accused his employer of age discrimination because it terminated him while retaining a younger worker whom he had trained. His supervisor allegedly told him that the company had a succession plan “where you bring in younger people, train them, so that when the older people leave, you’ll have younger people.” The plaintiff also had a recording on which the supervisor said: “We’re all of the same age and we’re all going to retire; I had the opportunity to bring the next generation in, so that’s what we decided to do.”

A lower court held that these statements expressed only a concern for maximizing the firm’s return on investment by retaining employees who would stay with it longer. The appeals court disagreed, arguing that this concern about employees’ potential longevity with the company could be considered a smoke screen for direct evidence of age bias. What’s more, although the supervisor stated that the younger employee was a better performer, he had written a strong letter of recommendation for the plaintiff.

The moral of the story: Keep a close eye on termination decisions that involve older employees.

Article courtesy of Worklaw® Network firm Shawe Rosenthal (www.shawe.com).

A frequent question at the Job Accommodation Network is whether the ADA requires employers to provide accommodations for a disabled employee who has trouble getting to and from work because of his or her condition. A related question is whether it makes any difference if the employee’s only disability-related problem is the commute; if once at work, he or she has no problem performing the job.

The answer to the first question is “yes”; employers must consider some accommodations related to commuting problems. The answer to the second question is “no;” it doesn’t matter whether the employee is able to perform the job fully without the need for accommodations at work.

According to informal guidance from the ADA Policy Division of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, although employers don’t have to actually transport an employee with a disability to and from work (unless the employer provides this as a perk of employment), employers might have to provide other accommodations, such as changing an employee’s schedule so that he or she can access available transportation, reassigning an employee to a location closer to home when the length of the commute is the problem, or allowing an employee to telecommute.

The underlying reason why employers might have to provide such accommodations is that the employer usually controls employee schedules and work locations; so, when a schedule or work location poses a barrier to an employee with a disability, the employer must consider reasonable accommodation to overcome this problem. As with any accommodation under the ADA, when considering accommodations related to commuting, employers can choose among effective accommodation options and do not have to provide an accommodation that poses an undue hardship.

Linda Carter Batiste, J.D.

The Job Accommodation Network

Guess what? 401(k) plans that supply more money and a larger number of participants to a vendor receive certain benefits that smaller programs don’t enjoy. These might be extra services or fewer basis points in administrative costs. However, if you’re using a smaller plan, don’t fret: What you signed on for initially isn’t necessarily what you must live with forever.

A growing plan should be alert for any discounts and services for which it might be eligible once it reaches certain thresholds. Experts say that when companies get to about an average account balance of $30,000 they should start negotiating for a better deal or tell the plan provider that they’re looking for another vendor. Investment companies don’t want to lose their business.

Most providers designate certain products for specific plans. Some look at the number of participants; others consider the size of the plan portfolio. Still others use average account balance as a gauge. For example, one major fund company divides its clients into five groups based on size and offers different services for each classification, ranging from electronic 401(k) plans for the smallest group to defined benefit administration and consulting services for the largest. Another offers similar services for both small and medium-sized 401(k) plans, but charges different prices to each. As assets rise, an automatic adjustment feature decreases the charge.

The moral: Stay on top of your company’s plan and follow up with your provider once the assets reach a certain level. When negotiating for a new or updated contract, make sure that you understand the thresholds and try to have new product enhancements kick in automatically.

If the assets of your company’s plan have appreciated over time, call us for a review of the details. We’re here to help.

With open enrollment season in full swing, now’s the perfect time to evaluate your employee health insurance benefits. Unfortunately, a recent Aflac survey reveals that most employees don’t spend enough time evaluating their benefits packages.

*Two out of five, or 41 percent, of American employees spend under 15 minutes choosing health benefits for the upcoming year.
*Twenty-four percent spend less than five minutes selecting benefits.
*These same employees will research new cars for 10 hours, family vacations for five hours and new computers for four hours.

You owe it to yourself and your future health to invest time in choosing the right health insurance benefits.

Understand Your Benefits

Technical jargon on insurance papers can be confusing, but would you rather wade through it now or miss out on important benefits when you’re sick? Take time now to figure out which procedures are covered, where you can get treatment and how much deductible you’ll owe. Don’t be like 73 percent of employees who don’t understand their health insurance benefits.

Know What’s Changing

Maybe your employer now offers Health Savings Accounts or dental insurance. These benefit changes could help you stay healthy. Unlike 64 percent of employees who don’t take time to understand their benefit changes, you can ask about changes and understand them.

Select Partners for Long-Term Health

Now’s the time to switch coverage options if you want to switch doctors or pharmacies. While you’re inspecting your benefits package, make sure your preferred hospital and lab is covered, too. Your healthcare team partner with you for long-term health, so take time to ensure you can see your preferred partners.

Save Money

When you don’t make a careful decision about your benefits, you could be throwing away $750 a year on wasted premiums and lost benefits, which is what 42 percent of Americans do. Save that money when you invest time in choosing your health benefits.

Choose Premiums You Can Afford

Employers increasingly push rising insurance costs onto employees. By picking and choosing the benefit package options you want, you also select the premium you can afford. A few hours now prevents insurance premiums from straining your family’s budget in the new year.

Although nine out of 10 Americans auto-enroll and keep the same benefits every year, take time to ask your employer or insurance agent questions and verify the exact coverage you want. You’ll be glad you did.

Of the possible group benefits offered by employers, employees often say Dental insurance is one of the most desirable benefits. And, for employers looking into adding to their benefit offerings, the predictable and relatively low premiums associated with Dental insurance makes it an excellent option. Employers should comparison shop for a carrier offering a Dental insurance plan that’s applicable to the needs of their workforce and a good value. Whether planning to pay a portion of the cost of the coverage for employees or provide the coverage as 100% employee-paid, employers should know the answer to some questions before making a plan decision.

• What dental service providers will be allowed?

The employer should find out if the plan has a preferred network of dental providers and how the network affects coverage. For example, if the dental care is received outside the preferred network, some plans will pay nothing; some will pay a reduced benefit; and others will pay regardless of the provider, but have discounted network providers available. Plans that have a preferred network should also be scrutinized carefully to make sure they provide the desired amount of provider choice. Employers should know what the turnover rate is for the network provider dentists; if the network includes specialty services, such as pediatric dentistry, orthodontics, periodontistry, and endodontics; and if any network restrictions apply to dental specialty services.

• What are the covered and excluded services under the plan?

The employer will want to pay attention to what specific areas of service the plan will cover. For example, some preventive services pay for a teeth cleaning, but exclude fluoride treatments or sealants. If orthodontic services are covered, they might exclude coverage for services that are for cosmetic purposes or adults in general.

• Will the plan provide coverage for pre-existing conditions and extended treatments that began before the effective date of the coverage?

• What percentage of the cost of the premium goes toward administrative fees and what percentage goes toward the payment of benefits?

• Exactly how will service coverage be paid?

Employers definitely need to know what rate services will be covered at. Take a plan that says it pays 100% on dental cleanings as an example. The employer will want to clarify if that means the plan pays 100% of what is charged by the serving dentist or 100% of what the insurance company determines is the usual, customary, and reasonable (UCR) allowance fee. Comparing the UCR allowance fee can make a big difference in the quality of dental coverage, as it often varies per insurance company.

• Are communication materials, IVR enrollment, online enrollment, and other forms of enrollment support offered by the Dental insurance provider?

• Will the plan require a specific amount or percentage of employees to enroll if the plan is offered as a 100% employee-paid benefit?

With careful consideration, employers can pick a dental plan that meets both employee and company needs. One of our insurance brokers can also be beneficial in helping to come up with a checklist of considerations when comparing dental plans and carriers.

Relocating or work can be a good move for your career. Before you commit to a relocation, ask several questions to make sure you’re prepared.

Who Pays for the Move?

If your current company is relocating you into a different position, they may pay all the moving expenses. Verify this detail, though, or you could end up paying the bill.

What is the Cost of Living in My New Town?

Moving across the country or even to a different town in your state could mean a big difference in housing, taxes and other living costs. Research the cost of living and compare it to your expected salary as  you ensure you can afford the move.

How Will the Work Environment Change?

The work environment often reflects local culture, values and way of life. Your new office may be more laid back, more stressful or more energetic, which affects the pace of the day, your stress level and your work wardrobe. Find out as much as you can about the work environment to ensure you can be successful in the new position.

What Will the Benefits Package be Like?

The employee benefits you enjoy now may change if you relocate to a different office. You may also need to switch doctors and banks. Ask Human Resources to define any benefit changes that result from your relocation.

How will Relocating Advance My Career?

A relocation should ideally advance your career with additional training, development and promotion opportunities or it may be a requirement for future advancement. If the relocation keeps you stuck where you’re at now, you may wish to stay where you are.

What Will the Daily Commute be Like?

The way you get to work may seem like a small detail, but your new commute could require you to drive on busy city highways, take public transportation or bike or walk to work. These changes may also require you to upgrade to a more fuel efficient vehicle, deal with overcrowded public transportation or adapt to walking, and you need to be prepared.

In What Ways Will the Move Affect My Family and Relationships?

Any move has the potential to affect your family and relationships. Carefully consider your support system, family’s needs and friendships as you decide to move or not.

How Long Does the Relocation Last?

You may love or hate your new job and city, so clarify how long you’re required to stay. You may need to commit to the new location for a year or longer, but double check.

While a new job can bring many benefits, you do need to prepare yourself to relocate. Ask these questions as you get ready to make the big change.