Things to Consider When Preparing for Open Enrollment

Open enrollment is a crucial time of year for organizations. From informing employees of their benefit options to creating a quick and seamless election process, there are a lot of moving pieces for HR admins to handle. Planning ahead for open enrollment ensures a smoother process and increases employee satisfaction.

Here’s why your organizations should start preparing for open enrollment now and things to consider when planning.

Start Planning Early

It’s always wise to start planning for open enrollment ahead of time with the goal of creating a seamless experience for your organization. 

Holding an open enrollment meeting to inform your employees of the benefit options available is a great way to kick off the open enrollment process. If your organization still operates remotely after the pandemic or even as a hybrid model, you want to ensure your open enrollment meeting is accessible to all employees. At BerniePortal, we have employees in different states, so while we opted to do an in-person organizational meeting, we live streamed the event so employees could tune in remotely. 

Open enrollment often comes with a lot of questions from employees. Planning ahead by gathering carrier materials such as informational collateral or video describing the available benefits can help simplify the election process for your employees. When using HR software tools for open enrollment, you can upload all informational materials to an easily accessible place for all employees to access them, whether in-person or remote.

How BerniePortal Helps Streamline the Open Enrollment Process

Benefits administration technology automates the traditional employee benefits selection and management process. Instead of filling out paperwork to select employer-sponsored benefits, employees can make selections using a digital employee self-service system that automatically enrolls them in coverage once approved.

Typically, employees select benefits during open enrollment when they join a company or experience a qualifying life event. From the minute you recruit talent using BerniePortal’s Applicant Tracking and move them into Onboarding, the employee will be able to make all their benefit elections in the same place. This seamless transition throughout each phase of the employee lifecycle eliminates headaches and confusion, creating a more positive employee experience.

Moving your organization’s benefits to a digital portal allows for easier access and management of each benefit, granting you the flexibility to offer more robust packages. Offering more benefits can set your organization apart from competitors in recruiting new talent and retaining veteran employees.