The world of benefits is constantly evolving and it’s crucial to keep employee benefits top of mind. Your employee benefits plan has a major impact not only on your employees’ well-being but also on your cost containment strategies.
While we are huge proponents of taking a fresh approach to your employee benefits strategy, today we want to highlight a key element of your overall benefits strategy that can make or break the plan you have in place: Employee communication.
Think of it this way: What good are benefits if your employees are unaware of what’s provided to them and the value of those benefits? Effective employee benefits communication is critical to boosting employee satisfaction and ensuring your benefits plans aren’t derailing any of your cost containment strategies.
Employee benefits are the secret weapon to your cost containment strategies
Employee benefits have the ability to work for you and not against you. When the correct steps are taken, they are a huge value-add for your employees. The old-school, cookie-cutter approach to employee benefits needs to be thrown out the window. It’s simply not moving the needle nor making a difference for companies.
Instead, high-performing organizations are reframing their view of benefits – seeing them not just as a necessity, but as an intentional element to boost recruiting and retention, provide unmatched value and put those cost containment strategies in place. Partnering with a broker that knows how to craft an out-of-the-box employee benefits plan and effectively communicate with and educate employees makes all the difference in your quest to become an employer of choice.
Take this Fortune 500 Company for example. According to Employee Benefit News, when this company identified rising costs associated with skin cancer screenings, they began offering a free, mobile app that allowed employees to upload a photo of the area of concern for review by a dermatologist. In some cases, this saved the company as much as 50% in screening and treatment costs. They reframed their view of benefits – and it paid off.
The best part of all this is that better benefits do not equal more money. With Totem, you can do more for your people and spend less. Benefits plan education and employee communication should never come with an additional price tag.
Employee communication methods that make the difference
Totem’s Employee Communication platforms help to implement your cost containment strategies in two ways:
- The more your employees have a thorough understanding of their benefits plan, the more confident they will be in using it. This leads to a better use of benefits which reduces your costs and increases the value of your benefits.
- When you partner with Totem, you gain access, free of charge, to a Benefits Administration system and a Benefits website. We manage the entire technology implementation process from beginning to end, ensuring both function and quality.
Here’s how we educate and communicate with your employees – generally provided as value-add services by Totem:
Benefits Website
Your customized Benefits Website contains links to the enrollment portal, single sign-on availability, and a useful help desk feature. This website is an employee’s one-stop shop to gain valuable information and insight into their benefits plans. With these resources at their fingertips, you can expect an increased understanding of benefits, and fewer questions directed to HR staff.
Benefits Administration System
We also provide a web-based, mobile-responsive system at no additional cost to you. We oversee the build and maintenance of the system and design a fresh and updated user experience. Through this system, employees can complete enrollments and review benefits, confirmation statements and beneficiary data. This is not only beneficial for employees but your HR staff too.
Benefit Service Center
Totem’s Benefits Service Center goes above and beyond the average call center experience. Unlike others, our very own Totem employees are picking up the phone to assist and educate your employees. Our goal is to provide them with the information and resources necessary to understand their benefits. There are no requirements and no strings attached. Implementation is completely seamless and ready to go from the start!
With better benefits packages, effective employee communication and state-of-the-art technology, you have all the tools you need to reframe your approach to benefits.
Team Totem is ready to guide you through optimizing your employee benefits packages. Click to book a free consultation with one of our team members today.
