| By :
Jamie Simpson
Surveys have found that employees do not fully appreciate the amount of benefits provided to them by their employers. Employees have not tried to quantify the amount of additional benefits provided to them in terms of additional wages. Some employers have even tried to give the employees a breakdown of the costs associated with the benefits provided. This usually equates to around thirty-five percent or more in additional benefits. Even with this, employees just seem to feel that this is a benefit they are just entitled to. In today's economy many employers are choosing to try and reduce their benefits costs by offering a flexible benefits package to their employees. A flexible benefit plan is where a smorgasbord of benefits is offered to the employees. They are then free to choose which benefits fit their needs. The employer will offer a certain amount of purchasing power to the employees. They will then choose the benefits that they want to have in their plan. If they do not have enough purchasing power to pay for the benefit package that they have chosen, then they will make up the difference with their own funds. This is usually accomplished with a payroll deduction. Some of the benefits which are offered by employers include health insurance, dental, vision, long or short term disability, additional time off, accident insurance and term life insurance. Employers who offer this type of flexible benefits have found that they have been able to reduce their benefit costs by around twenty percent. Surveys indicate that employers feel that offering flexible benefits results in only a slight increase in administrative costs and the employees have a sense of ownership of their benefit package. Voluntary benefits seem to be a significant part of a strategic benefits approach by companies. In the past, the top three flexible benefits chosen were health insurance, dental and vision care. However, with the aging baby boomers, long-term care is now becoming more popular. This seems to be due to the fact that the baby boomers have experienced the effects of taking care of their parents and now feel a sense of urgency in providing another option for their own care. The flexible benefits package seems to be working for the companies which are offering it. Of those who currently offer this type of benefit, thirty-seven percent have indicated that they will continue to add additional choices for their employees. Surveys indicate that the majority of companies offering a flexible benefit plan consider that it has met their expectations and that the majority of their employees have responded favorably to this plan. Given these survey results, you can probably expect that more employers will opt into this type of benefit package to control their benefit costs and to inform employees of what the true benefit is to them.
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