Top 10 Reasons why HR and employees HATE open enrollment

We’ve compiled this of reasons (in movie format) that we’ve actually been told why HR & Payroll departments and the employees that they serve absolutely HATE open enrollment. This list is neither complete, nor in any particular order, and please feel free to comment below to add to it.

Top Ten Open Enrollment Headaches

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In the spirit of total transparency: We get it. We know how much HR, Payroll and employees hate open enrollment. They hate manual open enrollment and they hate web based open enrollments that don’t make sense to the employee and aren’t simple to set up for HR, and don’t interface well with Payroll. This is why we developed our self service differently, and why we offer carrier connect. Want to know how we can help you love open enrollment? Schedule a demo today.

What to Look for in a Payroll System-Part 1

By Guest Blogger, Mike Lin

Choosing a new payroll system can be scary for many organizations.

Perhaps this is your first time purchasing a system. Do you know exactly what to look for? Do you even know where to begin? Or what about those organizations that have had a system for a while, but are looking for a change because their current system just doesn’t work they way they want it to.

We’ve heard this tale all too frequently from our new customers.

But we’re here to let you know that it doesn’t have to be the scary undertaking you think it might be. As a matter of fact, we’ve put a list together of what you should look for in a payroll system. Now, though the original list contains 10 hot button items, some take some explaining, so we’re going to break the list up into two posts.

5 (of 10) Things to Look for:

Payroll as part of a complete Workforce Management Solution

For most businesses, payroll is just one piece of what you need to fully manage and support your work force. Keep in mind the other needs that your business has or will have as you grow. Will you need a solution to manage the recruiting process? Will you need an HR management solution? If you’ve got a large number of hourly employees, surely you’ll need some kind of time and attendance solution.

Ideally, the payroll system that you choose should be part of a complete workforce management solution or alternatively should have the capability to integrate with other systems. Make sure that there is tight integration amongst the different pieces so that employee information and data can flow automatically and seamlessly between each component.

Empower your employees with Employee Self-Service

If the payroll system you are looking at does not offer a web-based employee self-service portal, keep looking. This feature will allow you to provide better service to your employees, and it will reduce the burden of responding to employee inquiries.

A good employee self-service portal will empower your employees to access all of their past paystubs, setup direct deposit, make changes to their W-4 information, and access W-2 forms at the end of the year. Remember the importance of a complete Work Force Management Solution? This comes into play again here. With a complete solution, your employee self-service portal should also allow your employees to make and review benefit selections, request time off, enter time sheet data, and update basic employee information like address and emergency contacts.

Integration with Accounting Systems

Make sure that there is a way to export/import general ledger entries from your payroll system to your accounting system. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck typing in journal entries which leads to mistakes, lost time, and plenty of headaches.

Scalable as your company grows

Say your company grows like a weed and doubles its workforce, and then doubles again! Fantastic…unless your payroll system grinds to a halt and becomes unwieldy to use. Many of the lower end payroll systems are fine for small businesses, but once you hit a certain employee limit, you’re in trouble. Migration from one payroll system to another is a pain that you want to avoid. Make sure that the payroll system you choose can scale to support hundreds or thousands of employees.

Robust reporting capabilities

A good payroll system will provide a robust set of standard reports that you can run and access at any time. A great payroll system will also provide a way to easily create custom reports because inevitably you’ll run into a situation where the standard reports just aren’t providing what you need.

Look for the the other half of this post later this week. And we’d love your thoughts and comments about anything we may have missed. Just use the comment section below.

Do You Have the Open Enrollment Blues?

If you’re like most individuals working in Human Resources you know all too well how overwhelming open enrollment can be not only for your HR staff, but also the rest of the organization. According to SHRM, HR Managers spend “an estimated 25 to 30 percent of their time managing employee benefits.” During an open enrollment period that number increases, to the degree that some HR departments even bring in temporary labor to assist with the influx of inquires. Other times, a company will simply outsource inquiries to a call center, incurring additional costs. Since the Healthcare Reform Act was passed there is even more information that your employees need, and many more laws with which you must be in compliance. Many companies are trying to find more efficient ways to keep their employees informed on the heath care plans and information. In this post, we’ll discuss open enrollment, the major responsibilities of HR, and some ways to improve the overall open enrollment process and experience.

Simply put, open enrollment is a period of time your employees enroll in benefits or change from one plan to another. After open enrollment is closed, the employee coverage is locked until the next open enrollment period begins. To ensure employees choose the healthcare plan that fits them best, companies dedicate countless hours, additional resources and lots of time ensuring that employees are informed. After all, we want our employees to be happy and healthy, because a happy worker is a productive worker.

Some of the major responsibilities for HR during open enrollment include choosing a benefits package, selecting and preparing communications for employees, setting the stage to make it easy for employees to complete open enrollment and keying updates and changes into additional systems. In each of these responsibilities comes an element of change management. Through the use of today’s available HRIS/HRMS tools, companies are finding it easier to manage the open enrollment process. A great example of such a tool is AscentisHR which is a fully integrated solution connecting open enrollment, self-service and HR administration together as one. The truth is that open enrollment need no longer be a pain point. It doesn’t have to be so arduous or time consuming for HR or for the employee. Employee Self-Service is the answer.

What Self-Service Looks Like. Literally.

Click on this image to see the full screenshot

The self-service open enrollment wizard provides a straightforward and intuitive approach to guide and inform employees on benefit selection. The system allows the employees to compare benefits side-by-side, elect alternative plans, submit benefits electronically to the carrier, and much more. Outside of open enrollment, the onus is placed on the employee to update their personal information throughout the year, taking the burden off of HR. Click here learn more about self-service and other Ascentis solutions.

For more information, or to request a product demonstration, fill out this short form and we’ll show you how we can help your Human Resources department be more accelerated, efficient and compliant. Subscribe to our monthly newsletter, the Ascentis HR, Benefits and Payroll News, and stay on top of industry news, best practices and always-evolving legislation. Follow Ascentis on Twitter and “Like us” on Facebook to receive great HR, payroll and business tips. Feel free to share this post using the built-in share buttons below this post.

Watch this archived webinar to learn how adding employee self service your HR technology toolbelt can automate and accelerate the open enrollment process, virtually eliminate costly errors and make employees (and yes, even HR) happier during the open enrollment process. Or, for a bigger picture overview, this four minute self service demo, will give you all the info you need to determine if you want to learn more.

Going to the APA Congress? Visit the Ascentis booth and register to win an Apple iPad and other great prizes.

Ascentis will be attending the APA Congress as an exhibitor in 2010. This will be our first year at the Congress, and we’re excited to be a part of a great organization that has been working with payroll professionals for more than 28 years.

To celebrate our first exhibition with the APA, Ascentis will be holding drawings for Apple iPads (two will be given away at the show), as well as Ghirardelli Chocolate, Bare Escentuals gift cards and some great wine selections (all these gifts are products made by some of our most prestigious customers).

Ascentis Payroll is the ideal payroll solution to save companies both time and money. You get the control of in-house payroll with all the benefits of a SaaS solution. Other great Ascentis Payroll benefits include:

Ascentis Payroll processes in real-time, ensuring 100% accuracy and control.
Pay periods can be scheduled in advance, and off-cycle payrolls can be run anytime.
On-demand checks can be quickly created.
With Ascentis Employee Self-Service, employees can access direct deposit information, tax withholdings and paycheck history.
Used in conjunction with Ascentis HRIS, redundancy is eliminated and accuracy enhanced.

Watch an 8-minute tour of Ascentis Payroll.

So join us at booth #214, May 26-28, in Washington D.C. We look forward to making many new friends, showing product demos, giving away great prizes, and enjoying the networking opportunities with the APA.

Ascentis Blog

Information to help HR and payroll managers, recruiters, and compliance officers become more effective.

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