Working for a company with benefits is one of the most important things for many employees in the U.S. Open enrollment periods allow these people to choose the best health care for themselves and their families. And while every customer of a health care plan needs to decide what is ideal for their situation, it’s also up to human resource departments to help out.
The health care process can be streamlined if the HR department at a company knows what to look for in a health plan and is able to communicate the advantages and disadvantages of each plan to the employees. We’ll talk about how this can happen, like when comparing Aetna vs. United Healthcare.
We’ll also discuss how business owners’ lives can be made easier by providing health care benefits to their employees. This usually helps improve employees’ happiness, which makes productivity go up.
Attempt to Sit Down With Employees and Talk
Don’t give your employees umbrella statements about their health insurance. This is when it gets confusing for customers and they take a lot longer to figure out what they need for their health insurance coverage. It’s not always clear to employees what human resources departments actually do because they so often work in the background.
When helping during the open enrollment period of health insurance, HR can really make things easier by demystifying health insurance terms and talking to each employee individually about their health insurance options.
Talk about specific companies that employees can go through for their insurance rather than just the basic things health insurance companies provide in general. It might not aways be possible to talk to every employee in a large company, but try to talk to as many as possible.
Aetna and United Healthcare
Two of the best options for employees are Aetna and United Healthcare according to AM Best. Both of these companies are highly rated and trusted by health insurance customers, but human resource workers can get specific about the unique things each plan provides.
Some employees might be mobile. This means that they get moved around a lot, and they will want their health insurance coverage to follow them to the new location they arrive at. For these two companies, HR representatives can suggest that Aetna is better than United Healthcare because they have more hospitals in more states where they operate.
On the other hand, United Healthcare has a further reach on average, so HR representatives need to address this with their employees. If the employee at hand doesn’t intend on moving to another state, then they won’t care about the wider range of hospitals that Aetna works with.
The alternative to finding health insurance is an unhappy and stressed employee that doesn’t have health insurance and will be distracted while doing their job. Health benefits are one of the key factors in many people staying with a company. If you take that extra time to help your employees during the open enrollment, you may be able to keep more of your workforce for longer.
HR representatives should also teach employees where to look on health insurance companies’ websites so they can take the information they learn and keep researching on their own. This saves HR departments time and produces the results that they need to get their workers the proper health insurance.
Health Insurance Makes Employees Happier
If you’re a business owner, you need to get into the mind of the employee. Not having sufficient health insurance affects your workers because they are worried about whether they are going to be healthy enough to live a fulfilling life. Work doesn’t always come first. People have to value their health above all.
When business owners prioritize helping their workers get health coverage, they will see the productivity of their entire workforce rise. It shows workers that their employer cares about their well-being. It creates a great relationship between workers and business owners when there is mutual respect and a recognition that the worker is more than just a number.
Healthy and happy workers who are treated like people instead of cogs in the machine will grow the company’s reputation. More people will want to work for your company if other employees are happy with the benefits you provide for them.
At the end of the day, health insurance is one of the things that workers look for the most when searching for a job. Once open enrollment begins, it’s up to your HR department to give the specific advice that each individual employee needs.
Human resources can answer questions in a one-on-one setting, give workers time to compare health insurance plans, and then sound off with some advice. Show them what websites they can go on for further information and tell them any phone numbers they can call for more support. If all of these things are done, workers should get health insurance that works for them.
