Do you want to empower your employees to be better at managing their benefits and healthcare decisions? With National Insurance Awareness Day occurring this month, now’s a great time to focus on empowering them around a host of benefits, not just their health insurance plan.
Best Topics to Address on National Insurance Awareness Day
- Commuter Benefits
Summer is an ideal time to talk about commuter benefits because employees are already thinking about alternative modes of transportation—some will bring out their bikes, others will begin to take more walks as a way to enjoy the nicer weather, and many will look to public transit to avoid traffic jams on the highway as they travel to the beach.
If you do bring up commuter benefits, be sure to tap what makes these benefits attractive in the first place. The Benchmark Report from Best Workplace for Commuters cited the following as reasons why companies participate in commuter programs: desire to reduce traffic congestion and air pollution, desire to reduce the demand for parking, improved workplace flexibility and work/life balance.
You’ll also want to make sure employees are aware that in many instances commuter benefits cover ride-sharing programs like Uber and Lyft. A significant portion of Uber users are between 24 and 341. Letting younger employees know this may increase the popularity of your commuter benefits program.
For more information about commuter benefits, visit our commuter benefits administration page to learn more about Clarity Benefit Solutions commuter benefits.
- Decision Support Tools
How good are your employees at making the best healthcare decisions possible for themselves and their families during open-enrollment? Nearly 50% of employees are frustrated with the benefits enrollment process, and a significantly larger percentage lack the confidence and knowledge needed to make better healthcare decisions.2
If you think there’s room for improvement and empowerment, now is a great time to talk about how workers can make better decisions.
Catching their attention with decision support tools is one way to start a dialogue on National Insurance Awareness Day.
Decision support tools cater to your employees’ desire for independence and support. For example, our support tool, Emma, asks users a series of questions. She then uses their answers to find and present the best benefit options in a side-by-side comparison.
Most employees are going to enroll in their health plans online. Letting them know that they have access to this type of support during enrollment will give them a significant confidence boost.
- Maximizing HSAs
HSA investments are growing. But, if you don’t think your employees are making the most of the health savings accounts, now is a good time to talk about how they can get more out of an HSA.
One strategy is to tell workers about all the different items they can purchase with their health savings account card online.
Making purchases directly from an HSA store is as easy as shopping on Amazon, and most of the items employees would be looking for are available in an online HSA store. For example, employees could purchase sunscreen, sunglasses, bug repellent, travel first aid kits, vitamins, and so much more from an online HSA store, and these are all items they’re likely to use.
- Voluntary Benefits
Keeping your competitive edge in a challenging talent marketplace is not easy. To attract and retain top talent, you’ll need to get to know what your best employees and job candidates want.
A significant number of younger employees want flexible work schedules, financial assistance, wellness programs, paid leave, and unlimited vacation benefits.
Now is an excellent time to hold a round-table discussion with select employees and get to know what they want. Use their input to optimize benefit packages and incentives.
Where to Go Next
Don’t stop engaging employees about benefits after June 28th. Continue the conversation. Healthcare is constantly evolving. Benefits management becomes significantly easier and more enjoyable when employees are empowered healthcare consumers.
1. https://blog.globalwebindex.com/chart-of-the-day/uber-demographics/
2. https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/benefits/pages/open-enroll-benefits-confusion.aspx
