Category Archives: California Employer Health Benefits

The Benefits of Employee Benefits

Remaining competitive in the hunt for the right job candidates who will propel your business to success is a struggle. Once you find the people you need, you have to convince them that your company is a better place to work than your competitors. A strategic, quality benefits package can help you attract and retain your top employees.

Employees value a well-rounded selection of benefits, and health insurance, a 401(k) plan, life insurance and dental coverage are a few of the plans that you can consider offering.

Employee Benefits Plan Examples

Benefits packages offer value to your employees and help you boost productivity and retention in a cost-effective manner. Here are a few of the advantages of offering employee benefits as part of your compensation package.

Talent Attraction and Retention

Employees highly value a good benefits package. Developing a strategic benefits package that targets specific types of employees can help attract the right job candidates to keep your organization running at peak efficiency.

Once you have these top-performing employees at your company, providing a tailored employee benefits package will serve as a barrier to them leaving—a great benefits package can be a huge advantage when looking at retention strategies because it holds more than just monetary value for the employee. A bigger salary at another company likely won’t be as strong a pull for an employee tempted to leave if the other company’s benefits package isn’t as attractive as yours.

Healthy, Productive Employees

When your benefits package includes a combination of health insurance and dental and vision coverage, you will have employees who are able to take a proactive role in managing their health. They will have easy, affordable access to health care, reducing absenteeism due to illness.

When they are on the job, healthy employees are more productive than sick ones. It’s beneficial for your company’s productivity and your employees when they have access to medical coverage and time off when they are sick.

Satisfaction

A good benefits package leads to satisfied employees with higher morale. Employees who find value in their benefits are typically more willing to commit to their company because it helps make them feel valued—which leads to increased productivity and decreased absenteeism.

Efficient Use of Resources

Offering valuable benefits can help lower top employees’ expectations for salary. Many employees are willing to accept good benefits in lieu of a slightly higher salary.

This is an advantage to your budget because the value you present to employees with benefits, especially health insurance plans, can be monetarily equal to a raise in salary for them, while costing you less due to group rates and lower payroll taxes. Employers can avoid the hidden cost of paying extra payroll taxes on higher salary by instead offering benefits to provide similar value to employees.

Thinking Long-term

Even if you think you can save a little money in the short term by skimping on employee benefits, you will eventually face the consequences through a lowered ability to attract high-achieving employees, increased difficulty retaining your top performers, and lowered morale and productivity.

Offering a quality array of employee benefits will pay off through a stronger, more productive workforce with employees committed to your company.

Working with CorpStrat will help you develop a strategic benefits package that works for your budget and offers attractive options to your employees. We can also give you access to educational materials for your employees as you launch your new or improved benefits package. Contact us at 800-914-3564 or send an email today.

Managing Employee Benefits Through ACA & AHCA Uncertainty

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Health insurance changes in california

When Bill Clinton spoke about the ACA, (more commonly known as ObamaCare) during the 2016 presidential election, he said: “You’ve got this crazy system where all the sudden, 25 million more people have healthcare and then the people are out there busting it, sometimes 60 hours a week, wind up with their premiums doubled and their coverage cut in half,” Clinton said. “It’s the craziest thing in the world,” He wasn’t far off.

Political opinions set aside, the ACA overturned an entire industry and now California businesses and professionals are in still in a state of uncertainty, as they await the outcomes of legislative issues pending before federal and state levels:

What Does 2018 Hold For Employee Benefits?

The American Health Care Act (AHCA), or “TrumpCare”, would overturn and relax many if the mandates, reporting and plan designs of the ACA. While there is much left to be negotiated and detailed before we have a change in Federal law, the basics of AHCA are now widely known. In anticipation of these changes, carriers in California have filed several sets of rates for 2017, in anticipation of the law passing and potential overturn of the ACA.

Many states across the nation are facing a challenge with a single, or in some counties, even no choices with respect to carriers. Individual markets are challenged with rising premiums and carriers pulling participation. In spite of the multiple attempts to overturn it, the ACA is still the law of the land.

More Healthcare Uncertainty: Single Payer for California?

The State of California has their own (mysterious) plan: a proposed $400 billion dollar single-payer plan, that would take the place of all federal and state run healthcare systems, including Medicare and MediCal. It’s currently making its way through the State Assembly, and has a long way to go before it becomes law, including a funding structure for the plan’s expense.

With all of this potential upheaval, in the meantime the status quo will continue – plans will change/adapt each year to adjust to the ACA’s annual increases in out-of-pocket costs, rates for individuals will continue to be in flux, companies with 50 or more employees will need robust systems to allow them to comply and report to IRS, and companies will need to continue to manage their healthcare care expenses. Balancing the challenges of rewarding and engaging employees, while managing their bottom line, in an increasingly complex and changing regulatory landscape for all industries.

Health care in the USA, or California, won’t be solved by any one piece of legislation, and will remain a complex task for all participants. CorpStrat is dedicated to helping our clients address the challenges of delivering the most effective employee benefits strategies and products, and to help them deploy integrated solutions for payroll, benefits, HR, and compliance.

Employee Self-Service: Why Employees Care

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human resources management software

In the 20th century, there was a clearer delineation between work and life: there was what you did to earn income, and there was everything else. But with the advent of mobile technology — which allows employees to be “on” anytime, anywhere — work is no longer confined to the office.

While this mobility offers great advantages, it also allows work to infiltrate employees’ lives. It’s a challenge for employers, large and small!

Today, life is pushing back! The enjoyment of life is beginning to take back its rightful place in the lives of employees. Today’s employees put increased focus on happiness at work—they change jobs more often, their careers take unexpected twists and turns, and personal satisfaction can be as important as the numbers on their paycheck.

Employers are recognizing these changing priorities, by investing in employee engagement, culture, and team development. Technology is the key.

Using Technology to Put Your Employees First

This employee-first focus is shaping everything from office floor plans to vacation policies and management styles, making the workplace a more dynamic and expressive place.

With so much change in the workplace, employees are looking for more stability, protection, and a safeguard against disruption. If they can find it in their employer, they’ll show their appreciation through loyalty.

Between work and life, employees want harmony—not just balance. With this new blended experience, they expect their employers to keep up with current trends and proactively provide solutions for their changing needs. Specifically, employees are seeking a sense of financial and emotional wellbeing.

Today’s employee experience needs to be more complete.

Here are 5 ways to meet employees where they are:

Offering a breadth of employee benefit options helps to alleviate the anxiety that comes with the integration of work-life and home-life.

When employers deliver digital and tailored HR solutions, they help an increasingly diverse workforce find the assurance and security it’s looking for.

When employees have access to the right information on their terms, it ensures they can get the info they need to meet their lifestyle objectives.

By providing clearer information about workplace policies and procedures, employers can empower employees and minimize areas of exposure.

Lastly, when communication is simplified, employees are able to discover the immense value of their workplace and benefits.

This appreciation results in engagement, loyalty, and commitment to the company.

Companies that embrace technology to help employees bridge the gap between “old school” and full-service digital employee engagement will thrive in a changing business world.

CorpStrat’s 21^st Century HR Solution helps companies change the game and change the ways employees engage.

How can HR Technology Streamline ACA Reporting?

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54373926 - technology and business concept: man using a laptop with financial software on the screen

In past posts, we have discussed the value of a fully-integrated HRMS system for evaluating performance evaluations and hiring decisions. This value can also extend to your ACA reporting to the IRS, by reducing the amount of time you need to invest both ensuring year-round ACA compliance, and compiling employee data for year-end reporting.

Your HRMS dashboard can be configured to give you information on employees who are eligible for benefits, or may soon become available based on measurement period data, so that management can quickly make informed benefits and budgeting decisions.

How it Works

Employee Onboarding

ACA Reporting relies on a lot of basic employee information, including Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN). A properly secured and designed HRMS allows employee enrollment data to be cross-referenced by your payroll, legal, and ACA reporting HR systems, and can warn you of any potential TIN mismatch errors before you risk an IRS penalty.

Significant Life Events

Eligibility periods for significant life events can be small, and a major headache if an employee finds out too late that an election period has expired. Organizations can make use of their HRMS to communicate eligibility for insurance adjustment, as well as election deadlines to enroll or remove a spouse or child from benefits coverage.

Measurement and Stability Periods

If you have employees who work an average of 30 hours per week, these are variable hour employees – and their health benefits eligibility can be complicated. In order to reduce the overhead involved in hourly employee health benefits management, your HRMS can calculate any employees’ average hours worked per week, to determine their ACA eligibility during your Measurement Period, and track their eligibility though a Stability Period.

When further integrated with CorpStrat Payroll, CorpStrat HR simplifies the process. By allowing employees to enroll into the system online, CorpStrat HR can track employees through their stability period to ensure that deductions are made accurately and on-time.

Your CorpStrat Account Manager will help you configure these data dependencies by understanding your organizations’ individual needs and capabilities, and provide the information that empowers your employees, HR department, and management teams to make the most informed benefits decisions.

Ask us how you can spend less time on ACA reporting and more time on growing your business. Contact us today, or learn more about CorpStrat HR and CorpStrat Payroll.

What Are Employee Assistance Programs?

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For many Americans, admitting to having an ongoing health problem or mental illness is a source of embarrassment and discomfort – even if it is the result of a very stressful crisis situation. Many people would rather handle these challenges individually, and never bring them up with their leadership at the office.

The issue that leaders face, then, is that they are managing employees who are being negatively impacted by a solvable problem, and they can’t do anything about it. Continue reading →