It’s just a fact that employers, especially those in highly competitive industries, must have a striking benefits package to remain competitive in attracting and retaining the best employees. You probably spend a great deal of time and money providing your employees with an attractive benefits package, but do they actually appreciate what you’ve invested? Do they even have the slightest idea of how much it costs you to provide them with it?

Sadly, most employers will find that their employees have no idea what they invest in providing good benefits. In fact, a number of surveys have shown that most employees vastly underestimate how much their employer contributes toward their benefits. These surveys also typically find that employees tend to have a negative attitude about the benefits their employer offers. Most employees tend to focus more on elements like cost-sharing methods and uncomfortably rising premiums.

The good news is that most employees don’t have this attitude because they’re ungrateful, but rather because they really just don’t realize how much it costs you to provide them with their benefits. Considering you want and need a return on such a major investment, you are left with figuring out how to better educate your employees on your side of the story. Total compensation statements are one way you can show and tell the compensation story and help employees better appreciate their benefits.

Give Employees a Total Compensation Statement

If you asked your employees to write down their total compensation, they’d probably write down their gross income. Even though what you pay toward an employee’s benefits makes up a substantial portion of what you’re paying to keep them, an employee rarely considers what you’re paying toward their benefits as compensation.

You can illustrate the value of total compensation by breaking it down into various parts charts and graphs like the ones myBenefitStatements uses when they create a total compensation statement. When considering benefit total compensation statements, be sure to include any other compensation perks, such as employer-paid license fees, tuition reimbursement, on-site childcare, and so forth.

Include Cost as Part of Your Benefits Education

Most employers, whether it is during orientation for new employees or during annual enrollment periods, will provide at least one setting for employees to learn about their benefits. Employers shouldn’t miss out on the opportunity to also emphasize the value of the benefits being offered and to remind employees that benefits are part of their total compensation. myBenefitStatements is now partnering with a number of employer groups to provide total compensation statements during annual review time to show the total cost of benefits; what you, the employer, pays; and then the portion that the employee pays as well as pay increases and incentives paid throughout the year.

It will be impossible for you to capitalize on your investment in benefits if your employees don’t appreciate what you’ve invested. Remember, total compensation or benefit statements can go a long way to improve how your employees view their benefits.

These advantages alone, however, do not ensure that a voluntary benefits program will be a success. Careful planning, including the selection of benefits to offer, choice of vendors and well-crafted communications, are keys to program success.

• Bring in the kinds of benefits that employees want and will enroll in. Survey employees as to what types of additional benefits they would participate in if given the opportunity. Depending on your employee demographics, these could include additional life insurance options, long-term care, or even pet insurance. Voluntary benefits enable employees to self-customize an individual benefits package that is uniquely appropriate to them.
• Examine gaps in your company's current benefits coverage, and consider how voluntary benefits plans can be used to fill these gaps. For companies that have had to scale back on their regular benefits package, voluntary benefits can be particularly helpful. If your benefits budget is tight and, for example, needs to be dedicated to helping fund medical benefits, offering dental and vision on a voluntary basis gives employees easy and affordable access to these benefits.
• After determining which benefits your company would like to extend to employees on a voluntary basis, research appropriate vendors. Look for the product lines vendors offer, whether they have minimum participation requirements, how they conduct enrollment, and their initial and ongoing communications materials. Also examine the vendors' experience and track record working with companies of your size and in your industry. The quality of the vendor, employees' customer service experience with the vendor, and the vendor's ability to smoothly work with your company's human resources department and systems will go a long way in determining the success of your voluntary benefits program.
• Though the vendor will supply some communications materials, company communications concerning the program will help to incorporate it into your overall benefits program in the eyes of employees, making it more likely employees will enroll. Consider announcing new voluntary benefits offerings in a communication from top management, which will demonstrate the company's commitment to the program. Make voluntary benefits enrollment a part of your annual enrollment process, and incorporate descriptions and information on voluntary benefits offerings into the communications materials for your core plans.
• Work closely with the insurance provider you select for your company's voluntary benefits to enhance communications opportunities and enrollment efforts. This will be particularly important if any of the voluntary benefits have minimum participation requirements. Some voluntary benefits vendors will want to come in for presentations, individual meetings or enrollment sessions, all of which can be very effective in increasing participation in these programs.

Voluntary benefits can be a great add-on to any company's benefits program. Careful planning and consideration of the various issues that can affect participation can increase the chances of program success.

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• A recession may make it impossible to allocate additional company dollars to benefits, but an employer can give employees time and convenience instead, through various strategies-
  • Set up a direct deposit program for employee paychecks. Depending on the financial institution used, the direct deposit program may be a bridge to discounted financial services, such as free checking, waived ATM fees, and the like.
  • If business needs permit, give employees more control in balancing their work and personal demands through some form of flexible scheduling. This could include flexible hours, summer hours, compressed workweeks and telecommuting. Some employers find that employees on flexible schedules are better performers on the job, because they can more readily attend to personal issues and thus be more focused when at work.
  • Investigate adding voluntary benefits. These no-cost-to-the-employer benefits can add a dimension to your benefits programs that can be difficult to achieve through a traditional benefits package. Employees are able to buy benefits at prices more affordable than what is available in the individual market; they have the convenience of payroll deduction; they also have the convenience of benefits being marketed to them, rather than having to seek them out on their own.
  • Investigate discount programs. In these programs vendors offer their products and services at a discount to a company’s employees. The vendor’s motivation is access to the employer’s workforce, with the hope that the discount will steer buyers in their direction rather than to their competitors.
  • Although many workplaces have gone more casual, others maintain specified dress codes. Employees appreciate when certain days are designated as casual-blue jeans okay-and the atmosphere that can accompany a casual dress day can give the workplace a lift.
• Examine existing benefits programs to see what works and what doesn’t, and ask whether dollars should be reallocated to better meet employee needs. For example, are there medical plan options in which few employees participate? A streamlining of the available options can reduce administrative and program costs alike.
• Some benefits have multiple uses but may have been promoted narrowly, so that employees may not understand their true value. Employee assistance programs (EAPs), for example, may be perceived as a source of help for substance abuse problems, but EAPs also typically offer a wide range of services many employees could avail themselves of, such as childcare and eldercare referral and assistance with financial issues and debt counseling.
• Employees often underestimate the value of their benefits and compensation package, but there’s a good reason for this-many companies neglect to inform employees of what the company spends to make the benefits offerings available. Employees see their own contributions for medical, dental, etc., on their paycheck stubs, but other than during open enrollment-if even then-many companies simply never let employees know what the company pays for employee benefits. Consider distributing “total compensation statements,” which show employees the actual amount the employer is compensating them, through salary, mandated benefits (e.g., Social Security, Medicare), and the company’s employee benefits program.

As the economy improves and benefits budgets become less constricted, these measures can remain in place, continuing to enhance the value of your benefits package in employees’ eyes.

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