Choosing the right health insurance agent to provide small business employee benefits is essential. Employers need more than standalone health plans for their employees; they also need business consulting services, superb ancillary offerings to supplement core benefits, and HR administrative support.
Benefits brokers and health insurance agents bridge the gap between an expansive healthcare industry and an SMB. They assist businesses with information, guidance, and evaluation of insurance carriers, but how does a business owner evaluate health insurance agents or employee benefits brokers?
Significant cost savings are in store for SMB owners when they find the right benefits broker, especially one that partners with a professional employer organization (PEO). Many successful brokers are already partnered with top tiered PEOs. Small business owners who are looking to connect with a PEO broker may have some questions and be looking for insights on how the relationship works. Below, you will find some helpful
Helpful information about health insurance agents and how their support, along with a PEO, can boost your business.
1. How Can I Save My Business Money on Healthcare Costs with a Broker and PEO Partnership?
Independent health insurance plans can be expensive and risky for employers. SMBs have unique challenges such as budget constraints and difficulty meeting group health insurance participation requirements. Partnering with a professional employer organization (PEO) broker is an ideal alternative to get better rates and current insights on regional benchmarking to ensure their benefits plans remain competitive.
When evaluating potential agents, these are a few helpful questions to ask:
- How can you and your PEO partner save me money on my core health insurance premiums?
- How can you protect my rates during annual open enrollment?
- What voluntary benefits can you offer my employees?
- How will you service my employees and their dependents when they have benefits questions?
When delving into these questions, employers and decision-makers should look for brokers who can walk them through the process of how their PEO partner is able to offer large group rates and voluntary benefits to small businesses.
Through a co-employment relationship, professional employer organizations can offer large group rates that small and medium-sized businesses can’t typically access on their own. PEOs leverage their collective buying power to negotiate better rates for benefits such as basic medical, dental, and vision as well as 401(k) plans, life insurance, and other high-value ancillary benefits. These resources help foster growth and scalability for small businesses at a lower cost.
A PEO broker should also explain how they analyze the unique benefits needs of individual businesses, including how they gather complete and accurate data to provide custom plan recommendations.
To do this, PEO brokers should facilitate a conversation about flexible offerings, such as ancillary benefits. The PEO partner will manage the heavy lifting for the SMB and the broker. They review the SMB’s needs to determine which voluntary benefits will contribute the most value to the overall employee benefits package.
From there, the professional employer organization will work with the SMB to provide a variety of employer and employee information sessions and materials to ensure that the benefits offerings and the advantages are understood.
After that, the benefits broker or health insurance agent will work with the SMB’s decision-makers to complete enrollment and assist with the integration of benefits. Agents should also be able to offer transparency for each product they recommend.
SMB owners should expect to see a range of terms, rates, and benefits for any health plans they consider for their business. This will help avoid miscommunication, confusion, and dissatisfaction down the road.
2. What Experience Do You Have with Business Health Plans and Small Business Consulting Services?
Highly skilled PEO brokers are equipped to do more with less. The broker-PEO partnership focuses on SMB cost efficiency, product breadth, and client service.
Helpful questions to ask benefits brokers:
- Which PEOs do you partner with?
- What has your experience been with them?
- Do the PEOs you partner with provide additional support for your clients outside of what you can provide them?
Services provided by a professional employer organization can be transformative for small and medium-sized businesses. To ensure a partnership with the right agent and the right PEO, an SMB can benefit from some due diligence research.
Employee benefits brokers may be partnered with one or several PEOs. When discussing their PEO partners, make sure to ask about a few crucial signs that the PEO is trustworthy and can support the SMB.
First, decision-makers should find out whether the PEO is certified. IRS Certification means that the PEO meets the IRS’s background, experience, business location, financial reporting, tax compliance, and bonding requirements. A PEO without IRS Certification may not be the best option.
Next, SMBs should inquire about any other certifications and accreditations a PEO holds. Decision-makers may want to inquire about Employer Services Assurance Corporation (ESAC) accreditation and the Certificate Institute’s Worker’s Compensation Certification for peace of mind.
After discussing their PEO partners’ accreditations, qualified health insurance agents should be able to share examples of how they liaised with their client and their PEO partner to successfully build custom business health plans for the client. A positive experience between the broker and the PEO can be a sign that the SMB will also have a positive experience as well.
3. How Do You Ensure SMBs are Workplace Compliant?
Workplace compliance is essential to the success of small and medium-sized businesses.
A PEO broker or health insurance agent can empower SMB owners with the support and confidence they need to meet and maintain compliance standards.
Helpful questions to ask benefits brokers:
- How is workplace compliance evaluated?
- How will you keep me updated on new and changing HR regulations and compliance?
- What other workplace compliance services and communications can I expect?
The best PEOs have in-house workplace compliance experts to ensure SMBs have a comprehensive and effective approach to staying apprised of and compliant with labor law changes. This can include a plan for disseminating physical materials such as compliance posters and certificates of insurance, a strong communications strategy to notify the SMB and their PEO broker of updates to state and federal regulations, or even simply being available and responsive when a business or their employee benefits broker has questions.
With these measures in place, the health insurance agent or benefits broker can connect with their SMB client to go over how shifting regulatory and compliance guidelines will impact their client’s small or medium-sized business. Additional PEO offerings such as payroll services also help with workplace compliance for the SMB. From administration to payroll tax filings and withholdings, the right PEO will stay on top of state and federal payroll regulations for the businesses.
As business owners explore questions to ask benefits brokers, they should be sure to also evaluate their potential agent’s ability to provide access to these crucial compliance resources.
4. What Additional Benefits are Available for My Business and My Employees?
This is where a PEO broker truly differentiates themselves from those who do not work with a PEO. A strong broker-PEO partnership can help SMBs access a vast array of low-cost employee benefits plans that enhance recruitment retention rates. Even better, they can put together custom benefits plans with their SMB client to make sure employees get the core and ancillary benefits they need and want. A happy workforce is the key to a successful business.
There are several areas in which a PEO can provide additional benefits for SMB clients and their employees. In addition to basic health, dental, and vision benefits, they look to the SMB owner for practical benefits that can help improve their quality of life inside and outside of the workplace.
Helpful questions to ask benefits brokers:
- What software or online tools can you offer that offer modern solutions for things like employee education and benefits administration?
- What voluntary or ancillary benefits can you offer to differentiate my business for job seekers?
- What other services can you provide to add value to our partnership?
Effective brokers stay on top of the latest tech and help their clients find what is genuinely useful. SMBs should look for a broker who is partnered with a PEO that utilizes digital platforms to increase day-to-day functionality, flexibility, and efficiency. Brokers can help their SMBs improve communication and automate data recording with secure web-based HR software applications.
In addition to day-to-day HR support, PEO brokers can provide a rich suite of high-quality ancillary benefits. A wide array of ancillary offerings give SMBs a competitive edge in talent acquisition, improves their current employees’ job satisfaction, and improve value perception for the company.
Additionally, PEO brokers can get their clients access to business services that will streamline operations and free up time for the SMB to focus on its core competencies.
By acting as an extension of an SMB’s HR team, here are a few examples of what PEOs can provide to SMBs on the broker’s behalf:
- Small business consulting services
- Payroll administration
- Webinars and continuing education to benefit both employers and employees
- Assistance in maintaining workplace compliance
- Retirement planning assistance
- Benefit strategy and plan recommendations
- Supplemental health insurance and voluntary benefits
- Wellness programs
- Support for employer, employee, and PEO broker
5. How Do You and Your PEO Handle Annual Health Insurance Enrollment?
Brokers also play a critical role when it comes to helping decision-makers and their employees become well-informed healthcare consumers. One of a health insurance agent’s main responsibilities is helping employees choose the best benefits and get the best value for their client’s investment.
A broker should have the proper tools, practices, and resources to help SMBs save time and money during open enrollment. They should also be equipped to provide ongoing support to their SMB clients.
Helpful questions to ask benefits brokers:
- How can you streamline the open enrollment process?
- Does the PEO negotiate a new rate for renewal every year?
Effective open enrollment processes should include enrollment tracking and workplace compliance record-keeping. The ideal broker will prepare employees for open enrollment with educational resources that explain structures and processes. SMB clients should be able to rely on ongoing support from their benefits advisor and a support team from their PEO partner, even beyond open enrollment season.
During open enrollment, PEO brokers can give clients access to transparent, line-by-line pricing for health plans and other benefits, intuitive portals through which the broker and the SMB can work together to build benefits packages, and employee benefits portals, so the SMB client’s staff can easily manage or review their benefits online.
Are you Partnered with a PEO?
Benefits brokers in partnerships with professional employer organizations like PrestigePEO can help SMBs succeed. According to NAPEO, small and medium-sized businesses that work with a PEO see an average ROI of about 27% in cost savings. Additionally, their research found that SMBs connected with a PEO grow faster, have lower turnover, and are less likely to go out of business than SMBs that are not connected with a PEO.
Our professional employer resources help simplify open enrollment, daily operations, employee benefits service offerings, and various administrative responsibilities.
Top-Tier PEO Health Insurance Options
- Nationwide medical coverage through well-known insurance carriers
- HMO, EPO, PPO, POS, and HDHP plans
- Multiple plan options for dental and vision
- Extensive “in-network” options for physicians, specialists, and hospitals
Supplemental insurance plans
- Term life
- Whole life
- AD&D
- Short- and long-term disability
- Accident, critical illness, hospital
- EAP
In-demand ancillary benefits
- Identity and fraud protection
- Legal plans
- Pet insurance
- Home & auto
- Financial wellness programs
- PLUM benefits
- Commuter benefits
Concierge-level PEO Services
- Expert human resources consulting
- Payroll processing
- Small business HR management and administration
- Workplace Compliance assurance
- Risk management solutions
- Employee relations
PrestigePEO’s support teams, including HR business partners, benefits specialists, and more, become the point of contact for both the broker and the SMB owner. Our dedicated, in-house staff are available to the broker, SMB owner, and their employees to address concerns, resolve issues, and advocate for the client’s best interests.
To learn more about how PrestigePEO can help SMBs find the right employee benefits broker for their company, give us a call at 888-PEO-PEO1 or visit our contact page to send us a message.
