The Pros and Cons of Offering a Comprehensive Benefits Package
When considering the benefits you offer your employees, the balance between providing a sufficient level of coverage and keeping costs down can be challenging to reconcile. As much as all businesses need to protect their bottom line, a comprehensive benefits package can attract and retain the talent your company needs to thrive.
Let’s look at some of the most notable upsides (and potential downsides) of offering your staff a complete, comprehensive group benefits plan.
Why Having a Comprehensive Benefits Package Matters
While salary generally dominates the discussion of workers’ pay, the benefits plan you offer is an essential element of their total compensation. A well-crafted and implemented comprehensive benefits package can be more cost-effective and more impactful than increasing salaries. In fact, a 2015 Employment Confidence Survey by Glassdoor found that four out of five employees preferred receiving benefits or perks over a pay increase.
The value of good extended health, dental, and prescription coverage is especially apparent since the beginning of the pandemic. A 2020 report by Morneau Shepell found that between 60 and 77 percent of workers would leave their current organization for one offering better support for their well-being, even if they would receive a lower base salary.
Even if you already offer benefits to your employees, this concern is still relevant. A 2021 survey by The Conference Board of Canada and TELUS Health found an 83% gap between Canadian workers’ health benefits and the type of health benefits they want their employers to provide.
The Risks of Comprehensive Benefits for Small Businesses
While it may seem obvious that cost is the primary limiting factor in implementing benefits, many employers need to fully understand the ramifications of overspending on benefits. Unlike other expenses you may incur, group health plans are not a one-time investment.
Offering a comprehensive benefits package that includes services like restorative dentistry and orthodontics and group savings may seem attainable this year. However, it’s important to remember that you’ll have to keep paying that cost (or possibly more) each year.
If you start with a more modest plan within your budget, you eliminate the risk of having to reduce or cancel benefits. As harmful as it can be not to offer your employees a sufficiently comprehensive benefits plan, reducing or eliminating benefits you’ve previously provided can be far more devastating to morale.
Create a Sustainable Comprehensive Benefits Package with Zarmac
Ultimately, the goal of every business owner is to support their employees in a sustainable, efficient way. Each company has unique needs, and working with an experienced partner can help you find the ideal solution for your company.
Zarmac Benefits has been providing benefit programs to both new and established businesses for over 20 years. We take the time to analyze what you need and customize a benefits package specifically for your business style, now and for the future.
Zarmac provides critical analysis specific to your business to deliver real choices, advise on trends, streamline renewals, and optimize your plan design. We make it easy for you and your team by supporting the management of your program. We also proactively educate and eliminate questions to ensure there are no surprises.
Ready to protect your business and your team? Find out more about the Zarmac difference!
