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5 Tools for Creating the Near Perfect Open Enrollment Process

The perfect open enrollment process: does such a thing even exist?

COVID-19 has changed how businesses operate, the most dramatic of these changes is managing open enrollment for benefits. Gone are the days of handing out papers at in-office lunch meetings where an HR professional would walk the team through new benefit plans. Now, employers have to find creative ways to clearly lay out benefits to remote employees so they can choose their plans easily.

This year’s open enrollment process does not come with the additional pain of high increases in premiums, however, employees’ expectations of what makes a benefit plan appealing have changed. They are much more interested in benefits—their cost and how their coverage will hold up in light of the pandemic.

Here are some helpful tools to guide and create the near perfect open enrollment process:

1. Go Digital.

If your company is still processing Open Enrollment through paper, you’re behind the curve and could lose current and prospective employees. The employees of today expect automation—they want to be able to sign documents, change information, and make requests online or through a mobile app. Automation also does so much for your company in terms of efficiency and compliance. Be sure you’re using one of these automation tools, it’s an absolute must.

2. Be Bold & Vibrant.

It might be a little hard to build a great story and message through plain text but if you use videos and some cool graphics, you can really help employees understand what benefits are best for them and help them determine what programs compliment their family’s needs.

3. Explain Cost.

Be sure to clearly explain the deductions that employees will make from their paychecks. How frequently it will happen and that they’re pre-tax so they know they’re getting more bang for their buck.

4. Offer Voluntary Benefits.

More than ever, employers need to build a robust package that includes things like voluntary benefit programs. In the past some of these programs were seen as a bit silly but in today’s diverse workplace, employees want more options—disability, accident, cancer, critical illness are all great add-ons.

5. Tell Your Story.

Tell it loud. Be sure you build a comprehensive overview of your entire benefits package. Not just singular pieces of health and 401K. To your employees, it all melds together. Employees are going to measure these offerings as a whole. They may not know the key difference between Aetna and Blue Cross, but what they do know is the difference between what they pay when they go to the doctor and what and what comes out of their paychecks. Be sure to communicate this clearly to your people. Don’t be shy about reminding employees about the power of your benefit plans, both at open enrollment and throughout the course of the year.

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Have questions about Open Enrollment? We’re here to help. Reach out to us at 818.377.7260 or marketing@corpstrat.com

6 Things to Ensure Your Benefit Package Is up to Par Post-COVID

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The pandemic has changed so much for employers. Just a year and a half ago, companies were grappling with adjusting to remote teams, securing PPP loans, and the uncertainty of so much in the business world. Now that we’ve got something close to a new normal, the demand for employers to build robust benefit packages is even more challenging given the difficult climate we have in attracting and attaining people. Employees are expecting more and employers are finding it difficult to deliver.

That’s why we’ve put together our top suggestions for making sure your benefits hold up in a post-COVID world.

1. Benchmarking

Ask your Benefit broker to provide some tools to measure both your offerings and your cost-share strategy. The bar has risen and employees are expecting to get more and pay less.

2. Benefit Packages

In prior years, companies slimmed down their benefits and increased their cost-share to employees. It’s time to revisit both as competition for talent is at an all-time high. It won’t be enough to offer basic health insurance. You need to make sure your benefit package includes dental, vision, disability, life, as well as robust pre-tax cafeteria plans for tax advantages.

3. Safety

At the forefront, employees want to understand their safety is put first. Not solely in regards to COVID protection. Many employees are reluctant to return to the office and need to feel that their employer is looking out for their safety and best interest to smooth over the transition.

4. Purposefulness

Employees are seeing work as much more than just a job. They want a community. They want a company that supports positive, proactive, and complimentary values to their own and consistently walks the walk and reinforces those values.

5. Remote work

Don’t discount the comfort that most employees have come to know and love. This past year has shown employees that they can work and earn from anywhere. So no, remote work is not going away anytime soon. Workers are comfortable working at home and a lot of them would prefer to do so. Be sure to build options around this and give yourself the opportunity to evolve dynamically.

6. Reward and Recognize

And repeat it again and again and again. Employees expect to be recognized when they do good work and reviewed regularly . Don’t be surprised to see younger employees seeking faster advancement and increased wages at a pace that most companies are just not prepared to address.

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If you need help putting together a robust Post-COVID Benefit Package, we can help with that. Reach out to us at marketing@corpstrat.com.

Is Your Time & Attendance System Losing You Money?

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Today we want to cover why it’s so important to have a robust Time & Attendance System for your organization. A lot of employers look at Time & Attendance Systems as this super simple thing: my employees clock-in, they clock-out, that’s the end of it. It’s understandable why you would want to believe Time & Attendance was this simple and easy. But we’ve found that what you don’t know can hurt you. This is one of the areas employers can really get hurt from a financial standpoint. Making sure you have the right Time & Attendance system that meets the needs of the organization is something you must invest in.

In a recent American Payroll Association Survey, they found that companies that lack a comprehensive Time & Attendance system had up to an 8% error rate in pay every payroll.

That’s more than four hours of wasted pay, per employee per payroll, that the employer’s paying for. That’s a lot of money. Think about that over a month or a year at x number of employees and do the math.

As an employer, I’m sure you understand the litigiousness of the employer/employee relationship. Wrongful termination suits are at an all time high. When ex-employees look for ways to go after employers, one of the easiest ways is through incorrect pay: missed lunch punch, incorrect overtime pay, no employee acknowledgement of time sheets, et cetera et cetera. And unfortunately in today’s world, the burden is on the employer to prove that they pay correctly, not on the employee to prove they didn’t.

This is why having a robust Time & Attendance System to help you reduce time errors, reduce overtime costs, increase compliance, increase efficiency, and put your business in a substantially better position is vital for success.

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Want to get set up with our CorpStrat Time & Attendance System? Let’s talk. Email us at marketing@corpstrat.com

8 Ways Not Having Workforce Automation Can Get You Into Trouble

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When it comes to your people management systems, are you in iPhone or a flip phone?

If you haven’t gone paperless, your company is stuck in the past. It’s time to avoid major headaches, increase employee satisfaction, track time & attendance in a single database, and make onboarding a breeze with Workforce Automation. You may be thinking, “isn’t going paperless a hassle?” We’d say by not going paperless, you’re leaving your company at risk for potential law suits, compliance issues, and major fines. If you ask us, that sounds like a MUCH bigger hassle.

Setting up Workforce Automation will ensure that:

1. Onboarding doesn’t have to be a time suck.

Onboarding no longer has to be a tedious process that spans a few days. Switching to a cloud-based database with a powerful web and mobile application makes onboarding a breeze for both new hires and for the HR department. With workforce automation, the new employees know exactly what forms they need to sign, the signatures are stored in a secure database, and documents never go missing. Also HR teams can rest easy that employees can’t claim they didn’t sign a document or weren’t made aware, everything is easily accessible and laid out in easy to understand checklists.

2. Time and attendance is ALWAYS accurate.

Tracking accurate time and attendance is more critical than ever. Take punching-in and punching-out into the 21st century with a powerful mobile app that allows your employees to clock in and out once they’re within a certain distance of the office or work site. California has especially stringent labor laws so as an employer, going paperless with time and attendance means you can pull a report on your workforce attendance in just a few minutes.

3. No one’s missing out on PTO days.

Nothing benefits a company more than having a motivated team. Part of maintaining employee engagement is to make sure they’re taking their PTO days and getting the rest they need to reset. Give employees visibility into their accrued hours via a self-service portal they can access from anywhere. Having transparent PTO accrual and usage hours ensures that PTO is properly paid out and reduced against balances.

4. Benefit enrollment is easy and your team has exactly the plan they need.

Benefits don’t have to be a headache for HR and confusing for employees. With an automated application, you’re able to offer your employees clear guidance on their benefit options. Once they choose their option, enrolling is simple and straightforward. Sometimes employees drag their feet on signing up for benefits, by going paperless, HR teams will know exactly who has yet to sign up, and can easily send a gentle reminder. Finally, going paperless protects the company by maintaining a reliable record, employees can’t come back and say they weren’t made aware or were never offered benefits.

5. Important forms and documents don’t go missing.

In the past, it was common for companies to have entire storage rooms dedicated to keeping paperwork. Nowadays, HR teams may keep a combination of hard copies and hard drives with computer files. This often leads to important documents getting lost, deleted, or simply overlooked. When important documents go missing, it can mean costly consequences if you’re faced with a law suit. Going paperless allows you to keep all mandatory files on current and past employees, all on line and easily accessible for employees and HR. No more taking up unnecessary office space and no more worrying about compliance.

6. Communicating important changes (like COVID-19 policy updates) is simple and no one misses the memo.

Failing to have an expedient way to communicate rapidly changing policies, like ones pertaining to COVID-19, can cause compliance issues. Not only does it keep you compliant, it also makes things like updating your Employee Handbook as easy as can be. No more wasting paper by printing out memos or Employee Handbook updates, simple make edits and hit “update” and you and your team are good to go.

7. Even when your entire team is remote, you can continue to build company culture.

Don’t forget: people need people! It’s been a tough year for company culture as so many teams have gone remote. Adopting workforce automation can actually help you continue building culture while remote. You can share culture building, like employee of the month or promotions, and company mission related information to your team with the push of a button.

8. Employees can access all the information they need on their smart phone.

Employees have come to expect that their information is readily accessible via smart phone and web and not dependent upon one person or email requests, why should their work place be any different? Increase employee satisfaction by up to 183% when you go paperless and allow employees access to edit or check their documents, benefits, and records—any time, any where.

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Thinking of going paperless and bringing your team into the 21st century? Schedule a call with us. We’ll be there every step of the way and make it a seamless transition, using a combination of our cutting edge technology and unbeatable service.

ICYMI – California HR Legislative Updates 2021 – [FREE Webinar]

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In case you missed it, this week we had a webinar where we talked about everything you need to know for HR going into 2021. This includes various additions due to COVID-19, policy changes, and new laws. Watch the full webinar and download the presentation PDF below!

Download the webinar presentation here: CA Legislative Update (2021) – WEBINAR

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If you have any additional questions, please reach out to us at marketing@www.corpstrat.com.