Maintaining Benefit Eligibility Groups

Use the Benefit Groups form to create benefit groups for each group of employees who have the same benefit eligibility rules for a specified benefit. Each benefit group has the same benefit eligibility requirements and contribution rates. For example, the client may have a “standard” benefit group and an “executive” benefit group.

To create benefit eligibility groups:

1. From the Onboarding & Benefits work center, select Benefit Plan Maintenance|Group Benefit Plans (Client)|Benefit Groups.
2. Complete these fields:
Use this option To define this
Group

The benefit Group ID. If you are creating a new group, use something brief but descriptive, for example, STD.

Note: The system automatically assigns the Primary Benefit Group as "1," which cannot be changed. (This Benefit Group Name automatically defaults to "PRIMARY," which can be changed.) In addition, if you try to delete the Primary Benefit Group, an error message displays.

On this Benefit Groups form, after you have entered a Benefit Group, under the menu, the form named Employees Assigned To has been redesigned. Use this form to view all employees who are assigned to the selected Benefit Group for the client. If you do not enter a Benefit Group and try to open the Employees Assigned To form, you will receive an error stating You must enter a benefit Group first!

You cannot search this form using normal search means.

The Benefit Group and the Group Name will be listed on this form.

The Active employee count displays the number of active employees assigned to the selected Benefit Group regardless of the filter option selected for the Status field below.

Status : By default the total number of Active employees assigned to the selected Benefit Group will be listed here. You can change this to any one of the options from the drop-down.

The grid will have the following columns:

Employee ID :- If you click on this hyperlink, the Employee Details form opens for the employee.

Employee Name : The employee name is listed here.

Employment Status : The employment status of the employee will display here.

You can sort this grid by any of the three headers noted above.

You can scroll to see all employees on a page. There are 11 employees listed per page. If there are more than 11 employees listed, then you can scroll to subsequent pages.

Click Close to close this form and return to the Benefit Groups form.

Click Report to run a report for the Employees Assigned To. Once the report is run, you can export the data of the employees assigned to the relevant benefit group. You can download this report into a XLS file on your system.
Group Name A descriptive name for the benefit group, for example, Standard.

Retirement Or Benefit Plans Only

Whether the group applies to retirement plans only, benefit plans only, or both.

Stop New Use On

The date after which this benefit group can no longer be added to new benefit rules or new employees.

Stop All Use On

The date after which this benefit group cannot be used.
3. If a benefit group includes Eligible Benefits for Group Benefit Plans contribution:
Use this option To define this
Benefit Plan ID Each Benefit Plan ID for the benefits that employees in the benefit group are eligible. Select a Plan by clicking the Benefit Plan IDlink to display the Select Benefit Plan selector. You can search using Plan ID/Name and the plan Status (such as Active). Any plans selected appear in the Selected Benefit Plans table. Click Done to populate the Eligible Benefits - Group Benefit Plans table.
Plan Description A description of the Benefit Plan ID.
Import Eligible Benefits A quick link to import eligible benefit plans. Select this quick link to display the Eligible Benefits import template in the Data Import Tool.

Note the following:

• The Eligible Benefits - Group Benefit Plans panel allows you to select one or more Benefit Plan IDs only if you have selected Benefit Groups Restrict Eligibility option in the Eligible Benefits Determinant field in the Benefits tab on the Client Details form. If you do not select this option, then you will not be able to select any Benefit Plan IDs. A conditional message, "Access to this section requires the Eligible Benefits Determinant to be set to Benefit Groups Restrict Eligibility on the Client Details form." also displays in the Eligible Benefits - Group Benefit Plans panel.
• If the Eligible Benefits panel is disabled and there is any existing data in this panel, then on saving the form, a message, "Do you wish to clear the existing Benefit Plan IDs in the Eligible Benefits section? Y/N" displays.
• Click Yes to clear the existing Benefit Plans data listed in the Eligible Benefits panel and save the rest of the data on the form.
• Click No to save all the data on the form.
4. If a benefit group includes a Cafeteria Plancontribution:
Use this option To define this
Effective Date The effective date for the flat company contribution amount.
Contribution Amount The employer's flat, monthly contribution amount. The system automatically allocates the employer contributions.
EE First Dollar If the employee must pay the first dollars, the amount the employee must pay.
EE Premium Only Whether the cafeteria plan contributes only towards the employee portion of the premium (Yes or No).
5. Click Save to save changes to the record.
6. Click Delete to delete the record.
7. Click Cancel to clear the form.

 

Note:

• When an Import is used, the Benefit Group will now be written to the employee's record using today’s date and a benefit group history record will be created immediately
• When an API is used, the Benefit Group will be written to the employee's record using today’s date and a benefit group history record will be created immediately.
• When using the Bulk Change utility, the existing functionality will not change but a benefit group history record will be created immediately.
• All New Hire processes (manual entry, Onboarding, Import, API) will trigger a Benefit Group History record creation using the Original Hire Date as the Effective Date assigned to the benefit history record.
• When using the rehire process, the Benefit Group will be written to the employees record using the current system date as the Effective Date. If the Benefit Group was not changed when using the rehire process, the Benefit Group will still be updated to the employee's record using the current system date as the Effective Date.

Using the Actions Menu

You can access other benefit group features using the Actions menu:

• Viewing the Audit Log
• User fields: Enter values for the company in the User-Defined Fields form. Your organization defines these custom fields.
• Employee Assigned To: Select this to view a list of employees at the company assigned to the benefit group.