Private Medical Insurance (PMI) is one of the most highly valued and utilised employee benefits among staff. Other health and wellbeing benefits can struggle for airtime. Benefits such as Employee Assistance Programmes (EAPs) and cash plans may be growing in popularity among employers, but there is a long way to go to transfer this enthusiasm to their staff.

While many companies have embraced all that these benefits have to offer, see great staff take-up and engagement, others have trouble getting them off the ground. Jelf Employee Benefits identifies five key reasons some employers are failing to get their employees engaged:

Your employees don’t know they exist

It’s not enough to just put such benefits in place, it’s important that they’re communicated to employees too. And this doesn’t just mean inclusion in an employee Welcome Pack for their first day. Providers and intermediaries are on hand to support engagement: this can include benefit fairs, group presentations and supplying tailored content for intranet sites. If companies need help in communicating their benefits then it’s important they make the most of any support on offer.

There’s no management buy-in

If management aren’t on board then it is likely to be an uphill struggle to get staff interested. Some providers will offer management training to improve understanding of the benefits and how to encourage staff take up. Better understanding at management level is conducive to better conversations with staff, and this leads to improved engagement.

Questions aren’t encouraged

While a lot has been done to make using cash plans and EAPs pretty straightforward, employees may still have questions about them. They need to know where to go to find answers. This may be their line manager, an HR department or a helpline. Questions are a good thing, they demonstrate interest and engagement, they need to be encouraged and you need a process in place to deal with them.

You don’t have a health and wellbeing culture

Staff are more likely to feel inclined to utilise healthcare benefits when their company has a culture that supports a positive approach to health and wellbeing. Healthcare doesn’t happen in a vacuum, it isn’t a tick-box exercise, it’s about encouraging good practice and responsibility that makes a difference. Healthcare benefits are more likely to be appreciated and utilised when they’re part of a wider health and wellbeing remit.

The benefits aren’t relevant

Matthew Judge, technical director for Jelf Employee Benefits says: ‘Both corporate-funded and voluntary cashplans are some of the fastest growing healthcare benefits, and one of the best solutions when providing healthcare to the uninsured population. So it’s a great first step for a company to offer such benefits, but it is just a first step. The measure of their success is how well they’re utilised, and generally companies that see the best utilisation are those that communicate them well, include relevant benefits and proactively encourage take up.’

Developments are made all the time to EAPs and cash plans. If an off-the-shelf package isn’t relevant to your staff, then they can often be tailored to specific needs, such as including extra benefits for therapies, stress counselling, routine dental treatment etc. When you’ve gone to the effort of offering benefits to your staff, you want them to be welcomed.

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