It’s game time.
If you’ve planned well and provided employees with well-thought-out communications about their benefits, your active open enrollment process should go smoothly. Of course, there are always hiccups, so below are critical action items and answers to key FAQs on how to ensure open enrollment goes as smoothly as possible and you achieve your goals.
minutes is the average amount of time employees spend enrolling in benefits each year, compared to four hours to select a mobile phone, according to a report by Plan Sponsor.
Open enrollment action items
Send regular communications through multiple channels to drive engagement and action
- Focus messaging one simple action employees can take each day
Position benefits offerings as resources for employees
- Focus on how they help employees build their health and financial wellness and plan for the future
Make an employee open enrollment to do list
Ensure employees know who to contact about any benefits and plan changes questions
Countdown until the end of open enrollment
Host regular in-person and/or virtual information sessions and drop-in virtual office hours
- Host your broker or benefits provider for an “ask me anything” session and to review plan options
- Employees want to hear from an outside, subject matter expert
Your Open Enrollment Checklist
The communications, tasks, and activities you need to do to make open enrollment a success.
Open Enrollment Communications Checklist
Communicating through multiple channels is critical. Stay organized with this checklist.
Employee Open Enrollment To Do List
Help employees stay organized so they can choose the best benefits for them.
Get the to do list
Open enrollment FAQs
How often does HR need to communicate about open enrollment after it’s begun?
Prior to the beginning of open enrollment, it’s important not to bombard employees with communication, so once a week is probably sufficient. But once open enrollment begins, you want to keep it at the forefront of employees’ minds. So once a day communication through a variety of channels is often appropriate.
How do we ensure employees sign up for benefits?
Make sure your collateral highlights the value each benefit offering brings to their lives, both inside and outside of work. Personalize the message, humanize the benefit by highlighting employees’ stories, and use data where appropriate. In addition, you can create an employee “to do” list that outlines the exact steps employees need to take in order to sign up for their benefits. It might be helpful to attach an open enrollment glossary like Lively’s to enhance employees’ understanding.
How should we approach employee questions?
Addressing employee questions on multiple fronts will help ensure that employees get the information they need without the HR team answering emails until the wee hours of the morning.
- Make sure your one “source of truth” includes all the information employees need to complete the benefit selection process. Then send multiple communications pointing employees to it in order to source the information themselves.
- Enlist the help of your benefits broker. They can host Q&As as well as field emails.
- Attempt to respond to questions your team receives via email and chat as quickly as possible.\
of employers say they are considering adding a Lifestyle Spending Account to their benefits package according to a study by Mercer.
Open enrollment summary
Here's what you should plan to accomplish during this period:
- Distribute employee open enrollment “to do” list.
- Continue to execute communication strategy.
- Host virtual and in-person Q&As.
- Enlist your benefits broker’s help in answering questions.
- Ensure all employee questions are answered in a timely manner.
- Employ a countdown clock prominently online, whether it’s on an internal website, in email communication or in another way.