U.S. employers used more technology-based communication with employees during the last open enrollment and increased face-to-face contact with employees as well, according to a new Towers Watson survey.
The survey, which was based on the responses of 209 U.S. employers, found 84 percent of employers communicated benefit choices in 2010 with e-mail, a jump from 76 percent in 2009. Podcasts, Web-based videos or online chats were also used as enrollment information tools last year by 33 percent of employers, which is up from 27 percent in 2009. At the same time, face-to-face meetings rose from 53 percent in 2009 to 60 percent in 2010, and human resources increased conversations with employees from 50 percent to 58 percent.
Paper-based benefit enrollment is declining, the survey found, as only 9 percent of employees, a fall from 14 percent in 2009, used this type of enrollment last year.
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"With health benefit costs continuing to increase, and benefit plans and choices becoming more complex, communicating with employees has never been more important," says Jeri Stepman, a national practice leader for health and welfare outsourcing at Towers Watson. "Employers are taking advantage of both the technology and decision support tools available to them to make the open enrollment process as efficient as possible.
"At the same time, they are arming their employees with information needed to make educated decisions about their benefits for the coming year."
During this year's open enrollment, 32 percent of employers reported helping employees comprehend new plan features was the biggest difficulty while 29 percent said handling more service center calls was the most challenging, followed by clarifying price changes at 26 percent. Implementing health care reform was easy or somewhat easy to 79 percent of employers, the study found, but 19 percent of employers said implementation was somewhat difficult. Only 2 percent of respondents said implementing health care reform was difficult.
Most of the health care reform communications was regarding the provision that covers dependents age of 26 or younger under their parent's employer-sponsored health plan.
The survey also revealed employers are planning to incorporate several changes in the next upcoming months. Almost two-thirds of employers plan to increase employee communication, and 47 percent are expecting to change their health plan design. Forty-four percent of employers anticipate offering more self-service capabilities to employees.
"Increasing support and communication to employees at open enrollment will remain a high priority this year, particularly when it comes to health care benefits," says Randall Abbott, senior health and group benefits consultant at Towers Watson. "As more employers embrace wellness programs tied to financial incentives, for example, effectively communicating wellness information and available resources at enrollment will be a necessity. And since enrollment is a time when employees are more engaged in health decisions, it only makes sense to use the enrollment time to promote the wellness resources and decision support tools."
The survey, which was conducted in December 2010, also discovered:
- Fifty-seven percent of plan sponsors provided participants with decision-support tools, but dissatisfaction with these tools increased in 2010.
- Eighty-three percent of survey participants do not integrate claim data with tools.
- In 2010, merger and acquisition activity among benefits outsourcing vendors was high. Forty-four percent of large employers, which includes companies with 15,000 or more participants, use vendors affected by merger activity.
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