Offering voluntary benefits is a great way to enhance your benefits package, differentiate yourself from competitors and increase employee satisfaction — all with little impact on your bottom line. This can be especially valuable amid continually rising health care costs and the unpredictable nature of the economy.
What Are Voluntary Benefits?
Voluntary benefits are supplemental, optional insurance products outside of the standard, employer-provided benefits that employees can choose to elect coverage for during open enrollment. The premiums for these benefits may be partially or entirely employee-paid, making them a high-value, low-cost add to employer-sponsored health plans.
Our research finds that utilization of voluntary benefits is on the rise for 2024. Download our Employee Benefits Market Outlook to discover more trends defining the benefits landscape this year.
What Are the Most Common Voluntary Benefits?
There are a wide variety of voluntary insurance products employers can choose to include in their benefits program. Some of the most popular offerings include:
- Dental insurance
- Vision insurance
- Critical illness insurance
- Life insurance
- Disability insurance
- Long-term care insurance
- Accident insurance
In addition to these common voluntary benefits, the following perks are slightly less traditional but on the rise:
- Pet insurance
- Pre-paid legal services
- Identity theft protection
- Car insurance
- Homeowner’s insurance
- Travel insurance
Before selecting which voluntary benefits your organization will offer, it’s best to conduct employee surveys, focus groups and other internal research to ensure you’re choosing benefits that your workforce will utilize.
Why Offer Voluntary Benefits to Your Employees?
There are many reasons why employers should offer voluntary benefits to their employees. These perks can cost your organization little to nothing to offer, provide great value through cost efficiency and convenience to your employees, aid recruitment efforts, and help build loyalty and retention among employees.
Enhanced Customizability
Ultimately, voluntary benefits enable employers to enhance the customizability of their benefits plans to employees’ specific needs and wants — without driving up costs. With a wide variety of voluntary options at their disposal, employees can pick and choose the perks that are right for themselves and their loved ones to create a well-rounded, holistic benefits package.
Meet Multi-Generational Employee Needs
Offering voluntary benefits also allows employers to better meet the needs of a multi-generational workforce. For example, younger employees may value student loan repayment assistance, while older employees may be more likely to leverage hospital indemnity insurance. Voluntary benefits create the opportunity for employers to offer something for everyone.
Because of their cost efficiency and portability, voluntary benefits are becoming a central component of many employers’ overall benefits strategies.
How to Promote the Value of Voluntary Benefits to Your Employees
When compared to employer-sponsored benefits, the value of voluntary insurance products may not be immediately apparent to employees. It’s up to you to exemplify how employee-paid benefits can be extremely beneficial for them. For example, one perk is that purchasing insurance through an employer group is often cheaper than buying individually, yet few employees are aware of this fact.
Communication is Key
When promoting your voluntary employee benefits offerings, focus on the advantages of having coverage, the risks of going without, and the convenience and value of purchasing through your organization and paying through payroll deductions.
It’s essential that your organization prioritizes coverage education to ensure your employees fully understand the nuances of their policy. Here are a few ways to prepare employees to make informed benefits decisions:
- Invite current employees to monthly or quarterly benefits meetings typically facilitated for new hires.
- See if your voluntary benefits provider is willing to elect a representative to discuss their coverage with employees, either in person or via video or phone call.
- While most benefits administrators don’t have time to meet individually with employees, consider scheduling small-group meetings to address your workforce’s questions or concerns.
- Enhance your benefits communications strategy by leveraging social media, digital content, a custom benefits website, webinars, videos and more.
Learn More About Expanding Your Benefits Plan to Include Voluntary Offerings
In summary, voluntary benefits give employers the opportunity to expand their employee benefits program without increasing costs. In turn, these optional perks are appealing to employees as they increase their access to a variety of insurance and other unique program options.
Connect with our team today to explore expanding your benefits program to include voluntary benefits, and to learn more about the positive impact this change can have on your bottom line, employee retention rates, and your organization as a whole.