Most organizations have, therefore, resorted to using software platforms to help them manage employee benefits and deal with all the regulations. There are various benefits software, including COBRA administration, QSE HRA manager, Cafeteria Plan Manager, QSEHRA manager, and more. The issue lies in deciding what software you need to help you manage compliance and capture the needs of your organization and the employees. Below are some pointers you can take into account to help you select the most suitable employee benefits software.
1 – Ability to analyze and manage changes for specific events
As much as open-enrollment is the major event that results in the need for benefits software, you also need software which caters to other events throughout the employee life cycle. This includes retirement and termination. Suitable software should allow for approvals and activations during open enrollment as well as tailored communications, event creation, the configuration of application, passive event management, and configuration of notification.
2 – Management of Paid-Time-Off (PTO)
Another major part of benefits administration is allocating and tracking paid time-offs such as sick leaves and vacations. Public sector organizations especially need this functionality as they have a variety of paid time offs which go beyond the regular PTO banks. These include adverse weather and community service.
3 – Ease compliance management
In the face of numerous compliance rules and regulations, it is challenging for businesses to keep up. Benefits administration covers a myriad of areas, including finance, labor laws, health, and more. The area of benefits management, therefore, has to be watched closely to mitigate risks. Compliance management should, therefore, be a significant component of benefits administration to help your business keep up with regulations and save money on litigations.
4 – Managing investment and retirement
Employees love financial security. It is a way to show that you value them and want to take care of their needs in the long-term. Providing them with resources that deal with financial security is the way to go. It is not easy to manage retirement and benefits programs because they involve a myriad of financial processes. This is especially true when dealing with stocks and matching contributions. Benefits administration software which incorporates investment and retirement management features, therefore, come in handy to ease the process. Consider software which provides flexible plan designs and organization and employee involvement.
5 – Integration of the payroll process
The benefits administration software must be able to integrate with the payroll software of the company. This integration helps to save time and avoid duplication of data and also has an effect on the employee take-home pay. Take-home pay includes 401K contributions and a pre-tax health savings account.
6 – Other factors to consider for your benefits software
While outsourcing benefits administration has its cons, there are some business processes that you can outsource successfully. Only choose well-established vendors. If you decide to use a third-party vendor, you can use the five pointers above to shortlist the vendor. An organization’s role in benefits administration also varies from country to country, so you need to pay attention to that as well.
7 – The benefits of benefits software
Automation by use of the software will cause you to accomplish tasks in lesser time, leaving you with more time to focus on important issues rather than paperwork. Software is also more accurate when you need to enter information into multiple systems. Benefits automation software also helps you to adhere to compliance requirements by keeping you up to date on reporting and regulation requirements.
If you have businesses across different states, your employees work remotely, or have flexible schedules; benefits software could not be more helpful. You can make changes to the system whenever you need to. Automation can also help you save costs because it allows you to perform an easier side-to-side comparison of various packages.