Innovations in technology have propelled advances in every field from medicine to transportation to food preservation. The same is true even in the insurance industry, including the world of employee benefit brokers.
Today, the evolution of technology has brought tools to the employee benefit broker that can catapult those who use it beyond their previous paper-induced limit.
From paper to Web
A standard core enrollment historically relied upon a tried-and-true paper card. Each company had its separate forms, which were completed by the employee in a group meeting with a broker, or with someone from their human resource department.
HR collected and shipped the cards to each benefit provider: health insurance to the appropriate health insurance company; dental to the appropriate dental provider; group life to the group life insurance company and so on.
This has been successful for years. The processs often consumed a massive amount of time.
Along came the Internet, and the world of employee benefit enrollments swelled with possibilities. The Internet immediately boosted enrollment efficiency, slashed broker costs, cleared HR hurdles and made a group easier to enroll and manage.
Challenges remain, however. There is extreme and often warranted skepticism about Web enrollments for many voluntary products. Participation levels tend to run substantially lower than face-to-face enrollments when using pure Web enrollment. In fact, brokers report averaging 10 percent or less in this kind of an enrollment. But add a human interface, and participation levels jump dramatically.
Core challenge
For core enrollments in particular, the Internet is a powerful and nearly necessary tool for employee benefit brokers.
"By offering a Web-based enrollment, you are meeting [employer and employee] expectations," says Lyle Griffin, president of Dallas-based enrollment software company, Selerix. "Both companies and the people being enrolled expect Web-based or electronic enrollment. With Internet penetration around 80 percent, this has been steadily rising over the past five years."
A growing number of human resource directors assume their core benefits will be enrolled on the Web now. What many of them are discovering is a program that leaves a component behind -- and offers the ability to manage core benefits -- that can make their department more efficient.
"It makes their business or job a lot more scalable. An example of the benefits of a leave-behind component is the HR director, who manages more than 3,000 employees' benefits, is now able to do it with only two people in the department. But the leave-behind is vital, especially as the trend is to offer more choices to employees," Griffin says.
For the HR directors who are not clamoring for Web-based core enrollments, the introduction to this tool often gives them the impetus to leave paper behind. They find it appealing that they can add, delete, make changes and send accurate information easily and correctly from the comfort of their own desktop. Of course, some will hold on to their paper and pen until the end, but for the increasing number who choose a Web enrollment, not having a Web enrollment solution will put any employee benefit broker at a decided disadvantage.
"The leave-behind is so valuable, even critical for a broker to have in his arsenal," says Angel Worley, president of OIS a Jacksonville, Fla.-based company that specializes in Web enrollments, online administration, call centers, and acts as a third-party administrator.
To the broker, the advantage to having at least one solution is vast. Just delivering accurate information to the right people and slashing paperwork is benefit alone, but providing a solution that makes a client's life easier, turns the broker into a hero.
On deck
Now that technology has gotten to this point, what's next?
Consistency is next, Griffin says.
"With core benefits, because of HIPPA, there is a lot more standardization just in the delivery method. But over the next five years we will see a lot of different options, especially in voluntary enrollments. Ultimately, we probably will see a further standardization," Griffin says.
Speaking of voluntary enrollments, Griffin might provide an answer for low participation in Web enrollments.
"Co-browsing is where the agent and enrollee are looking at the same information over the Web, with the agent controlling the enrollment until signature time. It works well in voluntary, but can certainly help a core enrollment as well," Griffin says.
Worley agrees that looking at it together can help, "Shadow casting is a great way to enroll."
She also insists that Web enrollments will only grow.
"Eventually it will be nothing but Web enrollments, as people go wireless, paper and laptops will fade out. The proper enrollment software makes everyone's life much easier, the hardest part will be choosing the right software partner, out of all of them out there," Worley says.
Make a decision
With so many different choices, how should one choose which enrollment software to use?
First, make a list of things you need the system to do for you and your client. Then decide which benefit options you want to use. Get comfortable with the system, and the support both you and the client, if needed, will get. Make sure the management piece as well as the enrollment piece is easy to understand and to use, after all not everyone will be totally computer savvy -- even with the pervasiveness of the Internet. Equally as important, be sure to find out who pays for the system. It is not free. Many systems are paid for by the employer when a leave behind is included. If a leave-behind is not included, either the carrier or you the broker is responsible for the cost of the system.
When looking for a system, both Griffin and Worley offer this bit of advice: Don't think core and voluntary are the same.
"It is important to distinguish voluntary from core," Griffin says.
Worley adds, "Core products are bought; voluntary products are sold. While the Web is the future for both, voluntary will always need some interaction."
Several systems can do both, but some can do only one or the other, so it is critical to understand which category your chosen system fits.
Core enrollments through the Web are now standard. Any broker who refuses to join the ongoing Web-based evolution does so at his own peril.
