To provide a group health quote, we’ll need some information about your company, including name, location, and industry, along with a list of your eligible, full-time employees (those working 30+ hours per week on average), their gender, their ages or dates of birth, and their coverage type – employee only, employee + spouse, employee + child(ren), or employee + family. We’ll also need the gender and ages or dates of birth for any covered dependents. Here’s a simple census form that you can complete with this information.

For fully-insured quotes from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas, Baylor Scott & White Health Plan, and UnitedHealthcare, we do not need any medical information. For level-funded quotes, which can sometimes offer lower monthly premiums for healthier groups, we may need to request claims reports from your current carrier or ask the employees to complete individual medical questionnaires. When you have completed the census form, please contact your JME agent or email us at info@jmeinsurance.com. We will send you a secure email that you can reply to with the form attached.

We’ll provide you with a quote showing a range of options from different insurance companies. This will help you determine 1) which insurer to go with and 2) which plans you want to offer to employees. Most carriers will allow you to offer multiple plan options. For instance, Blue Cross Blue Shield allows you to offer up to 6 plans; Baylor Scott & White allows up to 3. While this might seem like overkill for a small employer, offering a low, medium, and high option is not a bad idea. Having a variety of plans to choose from – including a mix of HMOs and PPOs, HSA and copay plans – allows employees to find a plan that meets their family’s needs and budget.

Of course, health insurance is not the only benefit available to your employees. Many employers also offer dental, vision, life, and disability insurance as part of their employee benefits package. Even if these benefits are not in your company’s budget, they can be offered on a voluntary basis. You may want to offer ancillary benefits through the same carrier you select for health insurance, but we will also provide quotes from other insurers so you can compare your options.

Now that you’ve selected the benefits you’ll be offering, you need to make a few decisions:

• How much, if anything, will the company contribute? For health insurance, the minimum is 50% of the employee premium for the lowest-price plan offered. There is not requirement to contribute toward the cost of dependent coverage. Of course, you can always contribute more. Not only will this help you meet the minimum 75% participation requirement, the employees will appreciate your benefits package even more, making it a better recruitment and retention tool. Other benefits, such as dental, vision, and life insurance, can be offered on an employer-paid or voluntary basis.
• How long must employees wait to enroll in benefits? You have the choice of 0, 30, or 60 days. Coverage will begin the first of the next month.
• Do you want to contribute to your employees’ Health Savings Accounts (HSAs)? If you offer an HSA-qualified plan, you can give the employees the option of contribution to their accounts through payroll. And you can make contributions as well. This is not a requirement, but some employers choose to help their employees fund their accounts, at least year one. You can even offer matching benefits to make sure the employees are saving as well.
• Do you want to allow employees to pay their share of the premium pre-tax? By setting up an inexpensive “Premium Only Plan” (POP), you can allow your employees to pay for benefits on a tax-free basis. They’ll save nearly 30%, and you will save as well since you won’t have to pay FICA or FUTA taxes on the amount they pay through a POP.
• What is the enrollment deadline? You’ll want to set the cutoff several days before the proposed effective date so the insurer will have time to process the enrollments and sent out ID cards.

We’ll set up your online enrollment portal and, if you’d like, and employee benefits packet for you to share with your employees. They’ll be able to review the information and make an enrollment decision. We’re also happy to conduct ain in-person or virtual enrollment meeting to explain the benefits and answer any questions your employees may have. Benefits communication is an essential step – employees who understand their options are more likely to enroll and will appreciate their benefits more.

Unfortunately, you do have some paperwork to complete, but we’ll make it as easy as possible. We can even schedule a call to go over the employer application, help complete the information, and send it to you for electronic signature.

Once everything is submitted, the insurance company will review the enrollment paperwork and request any additional information that they need. The good news is that the process is pretty quick. Once your group is approved, the carrier will send ID cards to the employees and they can begin using their banefits as of the effective date. Be sure not to cancel your current coverage until your new plan is approved, but you may want to discontinue auto-draft if you have it set up so you don’t get charged by your current carrier.

During the plan year, you’ll need to share the benefits info with new employees and let us know if anyone leaves your company. We’ll assist with employee adds and terms, and you’ll need to offer departing employees the option to continue their coverage under COBRA or Texas State Continuation. You’ll also have a couple of reports to complete, including updating your employee counts with the carrier and reporting employer and employee contributions to the government (RxDC reporting). JME will send reminders when these reports are due. We don’t send our clients a lot of emails, so it’s important to read them when we do.

Your rates will be guaranteed for 12 months. At renewal time next year, we’ll share your renewal rates with you and provide you with comparison quotes so you can decide 1) whether to stay with the same insurer or go with another and 2) whether or not you want to make any changes to the benefits you’re offering. We’ll update your enrollment portal or prepare another employee packet, offer to conduct ain in-person or virtual enrollment meeting, and process any enrollment changes the employees make. The good news is that you won’t have to fill out a new employer app – plan changes can be requested with a simple amendment form.

There are a lot of great reasons to offer employee benefits. Unfortunately, doing so does create some compliance requirements. We’ll share some information with you about these requirements, but ultimately it’s the employer’s responsibility to make sure you are in compliance. If you need some help, we can introduce you to a Third-Party Administrator who can assist.