Why brokers should consider carrier partners when comparing software

If your agency is in the process of choosing a benefits administration platform, there are seven criteria you should use to compare vendors. I’ve covered the first six — integrations, funding, licenses and more — in previous columns. Here, I’ll cover the final criteria: the software vendor’s partners. 

Every online benefits system wants to one day be integrated with all carriers and all payroll providers. But these integrations take time. Besides the technology considerations, there is the people aspect. Most integrations in our industry require meetings, negotiations and working the project plan into the already-existing workload. As a result, no system is integrated with everyone today.