Option one · online, step by step
Enter your census.
Three steps. The business, then the people one at a time, then a review before anything is sent. It checks as you go, so nothing comes back to you tomorrow with a question attached.
Would rather work in a spreadsheet? Download the workbook instead, or compare the two options.
Read this before you start typing
This page collects personal information about your employees and their families. We ask for exactly four things per person — date of birth, gender, home ZIP code, and who they are to the employee — because carriers cannot rate or issue a plan without them. We do not ask for names, Social Security numbers, member IDs, or anything about anyone’s health, and you should not type them into this page. Employees are identified by number here, not by name.
If your organisation would rather not type employee data into a website at all, take the workbook away instead — you fill it in on your own machine in Excel and send us the finished file. Nothing reaches us until you send it yourself.
- 1The business
- 2The people
- 3Review & send
Who counts as an eligible employee
Carriers rate and test participation on the eligible population, not the enrolled one — so an accurate number needs every eligible employee counted, including the ones who waive your coverage.
- Any W2 employee working more than 30 hours per week on a regular basis
- Owners of the business — eligible regardless of how they are paid
- Eligible employees who waive coverage. They still count.
- 1099 contractors. They are not employees and are not eligible for coverage
- Employees working 30 hours a week or fewer
The owner one catches people out most often. If you take a draw or a K-1 rather than a paycheck, you are still eligible and you still belong in the count.
Why a date of birth
Age is the single largest input into a medical rate. Bands get an indication close; they do not get a carrier to issue. Every carrier prices off the actual date.
Why gender
Several of the lines quoted alongside medical — life and disability in particular — are rated on it, and carriers require it on the enrollment record either way.
Why each employee’s own ZIP
Not for rating. For network adequacy. A plan has to give the people covered by it reasonable access to care — a sufficient network of providers and facilities where they actually live, not where the office is. An employer in one ZIP with a third of the staff two counties away is a real problem, and it is much better found now than after the plan is in force.
It is also the reason we ask for dependents’ details. They use the network too.
Why we ask what the business does
Carriers rate by industry as well as by age. The SIC code decides which industry factor gets applied, and a handful of industries are loaded or declined outright by particular carriers. Getting it right at census time means we go to the right markets first rather than re-quoting a fortnight later.
If none of the suggestions fit, leave it — your description in your own words is the part we actually need, and we will assign the code.
What happens to it
It goes to the carriers we are quoting, for underwriting, and nowhere else. It is not sold, not rented, and not used for marketing. See the privacy policy, which sets out retention and deletion in full — and which you can hold us to.
Not ready for this yet?
Ask for a consultation instead. Twenty minutes about what you have now and whether anything better exists for a group your size. Nothing to prepare, no employee data at all. If the conversation goes somewhere, come back here.
- Questions before you start(920) 243-4006
- Emailinfo@benefiba.com