The bswift Guide to Surviving Annual Enrollment

Both Halloween and Annual Enrollment are upon us! Although in your mind they may be entirely different events, if something goes wrong, they can both bring out the ghoulish monsters of the night! Successfully preventing these Annual Enrollment “monsters” can be tricky, so we have a few strategies to help you defeat the worst of them. Hunker down, take some notes, and be prepared to get a little dirty as we spill the best strategies to surviving—and thriving—during this year’s Annual Enrollment.

AE deadlines are fast approaching,
and so is the full moon

You may very well be in the thick of Annual Enrollment, or even in the home stretch. Unbeknownst to many, however, is that close to the deadline every year is a full moon…and a full moon means werewolves. These “deadline werewolves” pose a serious threat to employees who are scrambling to finish their enrollments in time. They bring with them the risk of uninformed benefits decisions, and even worse, a lack of benefits coverage if you have an active enrollment! Communicate with your employees to make sure they know of AE deadlines well ahead of schedule. The best way to accomplish this is through a multichannel communication strategy, spreading out your message as far and wide as possible. That way, you decrease the chances of any single message being missed.

On a similar note, leverage your benefits platform to maximum effect. Regularly publish content with deadline reminders and helpful tips to keep employees aware and engaged. Keep this information in a central hub easily accessible from your benefits homepage. Do your part to keep your employees informed and you’ll keep them safe from the deadline werewolves!

Prevent AE from becoming an
“energy-draining vampire” for your HR teams

During Annual Enrollment, your HR teams are working on the front lines night and day to make sure your employees are well-serviced in their questions and concerns about benefits. However, if your HR teams are overtaxed, Annual Enrollment can easily start to feel like an energy-draining vampire, especially if they’re working late into the night. Keep your HR team vigilant for this “vampire threat” by encouraging employees to utilize their benefits service provider who can expertly guide them through the process, or by providing helpful resources for employees to self-service. Only through preventative action can you protect the time and energy of your HR team!

Keep your employees alert and informed
to avoid an “AE zombie apocalypse”

Benefits can be complex, so it is prudent that your employees are given ample time to study up on their choices to make well-informed decisions. Any employee who is caught off-guard risks making hasty selections at the last minute and becoming an “Annual Enrollment zombie” (and anyone who’s seen a zombie apocalypse movie knows that zombies spread and create more zombies!) You certainly don’t want the threat of ill-informed and poor benefits choices to spread across your workforce.

Preventative action is the best solution to avoiding a zombie plague. Encourage your employees to utilize their decision support tools to learn about and select the best plans for them. Here at bswift, Ask Emma, our decision support guide, is well-versed in benefits education and works 24/7 to interview employees about their health needs, model costs and compare plans. You can also point your employees to published content, like educational resources and videos, built into your benefits platform to make sure they’re informed and engaged. bswift offers helpful content on our resource library, an “anti-zombie hub” that’s easily accessible from our homepage.

The threat of Annual Enrollment monsters can seem tricky to navigate at first, but they are easily defeated with a little prep, honest work and a reliable benefits technology and service provider. Put in the time to prepare, inform, and assist your employees, and you’ll see no werewolves, vampires, or zombies this Halloween season. Good luck out there!