Managing insurance benefits is a complex task that involves more elements with your group medical coverage being just one of them. The first step you should take is deciding who will be responsible for managing medical benefits in your enterprise: an old employee or a separately hired person. In order to make up your mind on that matter, here are some factors to consider when evaluating all of the possible ways:
General administration. Any of the plans you choose to employ should comply with the functional requirements submitted by the Internal Revenue Service, and should deliver the required information on time both to the policy owner and the insurer. The person responsible for benefits management will be working with your insurance company’s agent or broker, as well as make monthly, quarterly and annual reports to the IRS and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.
Communication. Any group health insurance program provided by the enterprise makes it a much more attractive place to work for employees, especially for newcomers. But it is very important to present the information about your program in the right manner, which requires the benefits manager to work together with the company’s management in order to properly inform the entire staff about available options and plans.
Implementation. To make any plan work just like it should work requires certain efforts from the benefits manager. The person responsible for this section of your company’s health insurance benefits has to make sure everything is implemented according to pre-set requirements and work with the management, staff and legal counsel when necessary.
Consulting. Insurance market is constantly changing and so do the needs of the enterprise in terms of health insurance. That’s why the person responsible for benefits management should be able to analyze the current situation and consult the company’s management about any changes and perspective of its insurance domain. The person should also be able to determine which deals and coverage types are most appropriate for the enterprise he or she works for.
The requirements presented below may not be very strict for the person responsible for benefits management at your enterprise, but it sure will help if he or she meets some of them:
- Experience in management activities, especially financial and employee related;
- Organizational abilities;
- Interpersonal and communication abilities;
- Knowledge in the domain of health insurance and related areas;
- Knowledge regarding rules and regulations;
- Able to measure performance and quality of services.
Typical responsibilities the person is likely to perform on a daily basis include:
- Management of insurance benefit activities with the staff, recommendations and consulting regarding any benefits offered by the enterprise;
- Administration of claim review committee and recommendations regarding claims in general;
- Informing employees about benefits and any modifications if there are any;
- Reporting when required;
- Managing plan implementation;
In case you want to assign benefits management to an existing worker then its better to provide a list of all the requirements and see how the person feels about performing these tasks. If he or she is not certain about it, maybe it’s better to hire someone especially for this activity at your enterprise.