Best Practices for Open Enrollment

SUGGESTED

Hello, I'm taking over our companies Sage HRMS/ESS and trying to get ready for our Open Enrollment in 2 weeks. I've found a check list in the Knowledge Base showing the steps I need to take to prepare for OE and that's been somewhat helpful.

My question is, what is the best practice for New Benefit Options for a new year? If we have new prices for MED 01 coverage, should I just change the this with the new cost? Or should I set the Plan Effective date to retire last years benefit and create a new MED 01 all together with the new premiums?

Thanks for the help.

  • 0

    You are definately on the right track with your Open Enrollment. The old plan should have the end date for the last date of the plan year and the new benefit plan, will have the start date of the new plan year.

  • 0 in reply to Elizabeth Nipper

    Hi Elizabeth,  What do you do in the case where the plan remains the same but the rates change.  When/how would we enter the new rates? would you need to create a new plan in that case?  I would hope not. Thanks. Angie

  • 0
    SUGGESTED

    If MED 01 is not expiring you would put the new rates in the Open Enrollment Rate Tables. Follow these steps:

    1. In HRMS,  go to Setup-Employees-Open Enrollment Insurance Plans.
    2. Click Add and select the MED 01 plan. This will copy the existing plan into the Open Enrollment tables.
    3. If the plan is not using Rate Tables,  go into the Enrollment Insurance Plan Detail by clicking the + next to the MED 01 plan or clicking on the plan name and clicking detail, enter in the new rates into the coverage, premium, or contribution fields.
    4. If you are using Rate Tables for the coverage, premiums, or contributions you would go to Enrollment Rate Table and edit the rate table for that plan.
    5. In ESS when you set up the plans and open enrollment you will put the plan effective date.

    Once open enrollment is completed, the Update Enrollment process in ESS will copy the rates from those Enrollment tables into the Benefit tables. It will also update the change effective date in the plan to reflect the effective date of the enrollment.

    If you are switching carrier or plans, then you would create a new plan code in HRMS in the benefit insurance plan before adding it to the enrollment tables as referenced above in parts 1 and 2. Parts 3-4 aren't necessary for new plans as the rates you put in the benefit setup will already reflect the correct rates, but always double check that they are correct.