Author Archives: CorpStrat News

Make your benefits sizzle by bringing them into your HCM

If you have a robust Human Resource Management (HRMS) tool, you could be missing out on the full benefits of technology and automation if you’re not adding your Employee Benefits management into it.

It might be surprising to hear but employees rank Employee Benefits as the number two reason they stay at or switch jobs. That’s right, Employee Benefits are second only to salary. Ensuring your Employee Benefits are vibrant, easily understandable, and technologically advanced will help you manage your costs, communicate your offerings clearly, and streamline your processes. Not to mention, it will give your employees the confidence that they’re truly valued and are receiving the best possible benefits in the market.

Being efficient matters.

During the annual Open Enrollment, which is just around the corner, employers have the ability to deliver many more options. Sometimes this can mean passing on costs to employees for a broad range of plans, like Voluntary. But the fact is, no matter how many appealing options are available, if an employer doesn’t have the technology that enables them to communicate these options and deliver these benefits, everyone loses out.

Money can’t solve everything.

Now this doesn’t mean you can just throw money at the problem. Just because you’ve purchased an expensive HCM platform doesn’t solve all your problems. You need to supplement your HRMS with skilled leadership and guidance to strategize on how to engage your team. Without this, you risk not being able to balance technology, wellness, and culture. That’s where we come in.

We’d like to help.

At CorpStrat we make this process seamless. We’re benefit experts to the core. Our team of trusted, experienced licensed providers is available to you, with no call centers or 800 numbers to get in the way. We’re real people helping real people, like yourself.

If CorpStrat isn’t your broker, let’s have a conversation. Just ask any of our clients about the value we create. We want to help you make your benefits sizzle. Give us a call at (818) today!

Are You Unintentionally Breaking CA Lunch Break Laws?

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california lunch punch laws

As an employer, you already have so many things to worry about, from delivering the best Employee Benefits packing to retaining and attracting your top employees. The last thing you want is to run into substantial fines for breaking California’s hyper specific wage and hour laws. Today we’re talking about how important it is to have a plan and policy in place to ensure compliance so you don’t end up having to pay big money.

Decoding lunch punch laws.

You might be saying, “I’m not so worried about this.” Well, here’s a simple example that shows just how complex this can get:

Let’s say your employee is eating lunch at their desk. Are they:

Working
Taking a break
On their lunch hour

Not so easy to nail down, is it? Making sure employees get their required breaks and that these breaks are recorded properly is a bigger challenge than it seems on the surface.

California law says employees must receive a full break allowance, so rounding up time clock punches is no longer a permitted activity. An employee who is not relieved of all their duties during their lunch break is still considered “on duty.” This includes employees who are relieved of all duties but must remain on the work site. An “on duty” meal break still counts as hours worked and must be compensated at the employee’s standard rate of pay. On top of this, now that so many teams are working remotely, it’s even more impossible to track when an employee is “on duty” accurately. More so than ever, you need to have a robust Time and Attendance system in place to ensure Compliance.

A great Time and Attendance system can make recording employee breaks virtually foolproof. Employees can use a smart phone app or web portal to clock in and out electronically from anywhere. This system is a win-win, it gives employees a simple way to track their time while providing you with an accurate account of the time worked and robust reporting so you can get a good look at the productivity and efficiency of your company.

Without a great Time and Attendance system to help you automate certain processes and accurately track your employees’ work hours and breaks, you can easily end up mired in a costly Wage and Hour dispute. Wage and Hour disputes are the number one, most popular lawsuits facing employers today. Let’s make sure you’re not next, get a plan in place.

If you don’t have a plan, give us a call at 818.377.7260

Why you need an ERISA Wrap Document today.

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If you’re a business owner, you’ve likely heard of ERISA, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, which passed in 1974. ERISA is probably one of several acronyms you hear about all the time but likely don’t pay too close attention to. When a business provides Employee Benefit plans to its employees — this means medical, dental, vision — they’re doing so under the protection and guidance of the ERISA act.

What that means is the rules of ERISA need to be adhered to. Whether you like it or not, as an employer, you are a fiduciary. One of the rules under ERISA is fiduciaries are required to have a specific document that outlines employees’ rights. It’s called an ERISA wrap document and it takes all of your benefit plans and wraps them into one document.

What’s the big deal?

Many people think it’s not a big deal. Frankly, most employers don’t do it. But what can become a big deal is the fines you can face for not having an ERISA Wrap document. You might be thinking, “the fines aren’t that bad or “oh, it won’t be that much”. We’re here to give you a little wake up call and share what the fines can be.

Fines for not having an ERISA Wrap Document can cost $110/day, per employee until the document is produced under audit. Let that sink in for a moment. If you’re hit with these fines, they’ll add up very quickly.

You might think, “I’ll never get audited so I don’t mind taking the risk”. But in reality, here’s what can happen: An employee is terminated and they feel they were wrongfully treated or wrongfully terminated. So, said employee hires an attorney and they file a lawsuit. One of the first thing the attorney will do is call the EDD. Then EDD will be obligated to call the employer. And the first thing the EDD will ask for is the ERISA plan document, because they know most employers don’t have it.

The Good News

Fortunately, the cost to prepare these document is very reasonable. If you don’t have your ERISA Wrap documents prepared, reach out to us, we’re happy to talk you through it and help you get one. This simple step will greatly limit your exposure.

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Don’t put yourself at risk. ERISA Wrap docs are easy and affordable to set up. We can help you with them today. Email us at marketing@corpstrat.com for more information

This is your sign to STOP Googling HR Fixes

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Googling HR issues. We’ve all done it but is Googling HR actually a good idea?

If you hop onto Google right now and type in a common HR problem, the first page of results will likely include widely varied, conflicting results. Why is there so much misinformation out there regarding HR?

The simple answer is HR policies and laws vary by state, city, and county. The correct answer will also depend on the type of employees and how long they’ve been employed. Google simply can’t account for all of these variables, making it very easy for you to stumble across the wrong solution.

In this highly litigious, complex employer/employee environment, we feel it’s absolutely too risky for employers to not ensure compliance in even simple things like leave laws, wage and hour issues, workplace behaviors, compliance laws, PTOs, and more. The exposures for employers are just too big.

What can you do as an employer to make sure you’re compliant and your HR defense is strong?

1. Don’t put HR on the back burner.

One of the biggest mistakes companies make is piggybacking HR compliance to another role like Controller, CFO, or admin. Not having a dedicated HR professional might seem fine in the short term but could lead to extremely costly consequences down the line.

2. Put a plan in place to cover all your HR bases.

Don’t wait to put a plan together. Hire a full-time HR person or an HR consultant that can keep a close eye on new policies and tailor the right solutions for your team. Purchase a robust HR program that can help automate compliance so you never have to worry about it. Typically, a combination of these solutions are right for most organizations.

3. Recognize that these issues are larger than most people are willing to admit.

The cost for failing to adhere to compliance laws can lead to tremendous time, resources, and money being wasted inside the organization.

3. Ask the right people.

Stop relying on Google for answers, instead find the right HR professional for advice. At CorpStrat, we have HR experts with over 30+ years of experience in the industry and we’d love to help you keep your HR defense strong.

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What’s your plan? If you want to talk about your plan and make sure you have the right plan in place, give us a call. 818.377.7260

Are You Creating Company Culture That Builds Retention?

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It takes a lot of effort to build culture, and it takes very little to destroy it.

A recent study revealed that 75% of workers cited Company Culture as the primary factor that influenced their decision to work at a company; for many, culture ranked higher than salary. It might be surprising to hear but job seekers are likely to pass on a “perfect job” if the Corporate Culture isn’t a good fit.

So what exactly is Corporate Culture and how do you create culture that builds retention. Read on to learn more.

What is Company Culture?

In short, Company Culture is simply the way things are done in an organization.

Every company has values, rules, and unspoken routines that make it a one-of-a-kind entity. Some are formal and some are informal but your culture bleeds into everything: the way you handle problems, the way employees interact with each other, and the way your leadership team carries itself.

It doesn’t stop there, culture also sets the tone for virtually every interaction your employees have with your customers. From emails to face-to-face interactions, your Company Culture is constantly on display in your employees to your customers. For your clients, it really doesn’t matter what you say to them, what you DO is what they’ll remember. This is why having a motivated workforce that both believes in the company mission and feels supported by their team is so key to building and fostering client relationships.

How do you build positive Company Culture?

Positive Company Culture trickles down to every aspect of your business. It can be seen in communications in your office, the way your team interacts, how your team behaves, and how your people connect with one another.

Good Company Culture will foster both engagement and retention. Conversely, bad Company Culture will emphasize punishment and reward the wrong behaviors. It’s hard to see how far reaching the effect of Company Culture is because its impact is both internal and external; intrinsic and extrinsic.

Signs of a bad Company Culture can look like toxic employee gossip, high turnover rates, and overall poor morale. If you’re noticing the beginnings to these behaviors, now is the time to act. Prioritizing Company Culture is a choice. It starts with hiring the right people to do the right jobs and continues with intentional effort. Building a great Company Culture requires thoughtful leadership, time, attention to details, and is not really based on compensation

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Building culture should be fun and rewarding. If you need help cultivating a positive Company Culture, reach out to us at marketing@corpstrat.com