Bender Insurance Solutions

Benefits

Our Benefits Team becomes part of your team. Bender Insurance Solutions knows that businesses sustain and prosper through the retention of their excellent leaders and employees. We are proud to have talented professionals and consultants who challenge conventional plans that, historically, have created average results.

Executive and employee benefit programs position our clients to excel in their marketplace. We are proud to present the finest carriers and financial-investment professionals to facilitate these programs.

  • Executive and Employee Benefits

    Executive and Employee Benefits

    Group Insurance and Employee Benefits:

    • Medical plans
    • Dental plans
    • Group life
    • Voluntary and discount benefits

    Benefit Consulting:

    • Employee benefit and strategic planning
    • Regulatory compliance review
    • Group assistance
    • Cafeteria plan design
    • Online enrollment

    Let us assist you in securing the competitive edge and your future prosperity.

  • Group Insurance

    Group Insurance

    Protection Through Employee Benefits

    Offering a variety of employee benefits is an excellent way to improve your business’s appeal to prospective employees and boost morale among current employees. In addition, for businesses with 50 full-time employees or more, to avoid tax penalties, group health insurance is now required by law. Finding the right group plans ensure that your employees are taken care of and that you are meeting all of your obligations under the law.

    With the majority of group plans being eligible for pre-tax benefits, it is a ‘win-win’ for the employer and the employees.  Even businesses with limited budgets find that offering voluntary plans reduces their workers’ comp payroll and payroll taxes.

    At Bender Insurance Solutions, our goal is to listen to your needs and build the group benefits program that will help accomplish your long term goals.  We offer a variety of group plans both voluntary and contributory such as:

    • Health
    • Dental
    • Vision
    • Gap/Medical Bridge
    • Life and Accidental Death
    • Disability
    • Accident
    • Critical Illness
    • Cancer Coverage
    • Long Term Care
    • Employee Assistance Program
    • Doctors by Phone

    Superior Service and Education Through Benefit Consulting

    As we listen to your needs and build a program customized for your organization, we are also looking at and providing:

    • Complete analysis of your current program
    • Review of your objectives
    • Regulatory compliance analysis to help meet the requirements of the IRS and the Department of Labor
    • Informative and valuable seminars and webinars
    • In and out of the box solutions including:
    • Health Reimbursement Arrangements
    • Health Savings Accounts
    • Gap plans combined with high deductible programs
    • Captive, Level Funded or Self-Funded solutions
    • Wellness programs

    As we listen to your needs and build a program customized for your organization, we also offer a way to reduce the hassle of the enrollment process by offering:

    • Online enrollment portals tailored to fit your ongoing benefit needs for enrollment and beyond.
    • On site enrollment facilitation and instruction with personalized enrollment packets
    • Per pay period calculation
    • Processing of additions and terminations
    • Employee Claims support
    • Online Human Resources & Labor Law support program.
    • Federal COBRA Administration
    • Creation and distribution of the required documents such as Summaries of Benefits and Coverage (SBCs), Summary Plan Description (SPD) and Medicare Creditable Coverage Notifications.

    With the increased government regulations and rising costs, you’ll find that having our team become part of your team is the best way to obtain protection, superior service and education for your company and your employees.

  • Self-Funding

    Self-Funding

    Self-funding is an insurance strategy used by businesses as an alternative to traditional (fully insured) business insurance. Many small businesses are considering Self-Funded plans as a way to lower their spending and regain control over their benefits. According to a study by the RAND Corporation, small business is expected to drive growth in the self-funded market resulting in an increase of companies with less than 100 employees covered by a self-funded plan growing from 4 percent to an impressive 33 percent.

    What is Self-Funding?

    There are many forms of “self-funded” or “self-insured” plans. Said simply, it is the form of the company contributing toward the employee’s cost of care. Smaller companies will usually protect their losses with “stop-loss,” which is similar to having a high deductible plan, and funding the deductible only when necessary.

    When a business offers self-funded insurance benefits to employees, the business accepts direct responsibility for all covered individuals’ healthcare expenses. Instead of purchasing a plan from an insurance company, the employer creates its own plan, collects employee premiums and pays covered claims from a specific account that has been set aside to pay insurance expenses.

    What is Level-Funding?

    Many companies prefer to know what their costs are every month. A self-funded plan can be set up as “level-funded” meaning you would pay a pre-determined premium every month, similar to fully insured programs. Premiums are funded as if employees are going to hit expected claims, however at the end of the year if claims are less than expected, the excess remains with the employer, increasing company profit margins or offsetting future healthcare premiums.

    Advantages

    • Company retains 100% of excess claims reserves
    • Avoid several costly ACA fees and mandates (1-3% savings)
    • Protect tiered rating structure for companies with 50-100 employees (small group expansion will bring member level rating to these companies)
    • Not subject to 10 essential health benefits mandated by the Affordable Care Act
    • Company chooses benefits and providers
    • Lower premiums for healthier groups, as opposed to paying for your neighbor’s claims
    • Population Health Management can be built in to provide better care for chronic disease
    • Leveling of premiums
    • Ease of administration and employee experience

    Disadvantages

    Self-funding isn’t appropriate for all employers. For example, employers with a small number of employees may decide against self-funding because their pool of insured parties isn’t large enough to merit the assumed risk. It is best to do a free Health Risk Assessment to determine if it is an appropriate time to go self-funded, or what measures would need to be taken to lower the risk of your company.

    Many employers feel that because they have several chronic conditions within the group that they won’t qualify, however herein lies the opportunity to learn about chronic disease management, doctor cost and quality, and various employee incentives and resources to improve the health and experience of the group.

    Lastly, it is important to work with a broker and plan administrator that have the experience and resources to protect your group, manage claims, and improve health of your population. There are many “packaged” or “bundled” or “ASO” self-funded programs that are entering the market as entry level programs. While these programs are mainstream and easy to get into, there are usually high administrative fees behind the scenes, limited resources for claims management, and limited flexibility with plan design and provider options. These “bundled” programs may last only short term because of the limited flexibility in addressing the cost drivers.

    If you are considering self-funding for your company, it’s best to consult an insurance professional to decide whether this insurance strategy is right for you. Contact Bender Insurance Solutions today to learn more about the pros and cons of self-funding.

  • Healthcare Reform Compliance

    Healthcare Reform Compliance

    The Affordable Care Act made a number of changes to the insurance industry for individuals and businesses alike. As an employer, you may be subject to certain mandates under this law that require you to make changes to your healthcare plan. Some of the most important provisions include:

    Employer Shared Responsibility Payments.

    Employers with at least 50 full-time employees must provide adequate health insurance for their employees in order to avoid paying an ESRP. This mandate may affect your business in 2015 or later, depending on the number of people you employ.

    90-day eligibility mandate.

    If your company offers a group health insurance policy, you are required to offer eligible employees coverage with an effective date no later than their 90th day.

    Reporting requirements.

    Employers providing insurance benefits to employees must complete information reports and submit them to the IRS annually. Copies of these statements must also be issued to covered parties.

    Marketplace notifications.

    Employers who are covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act are required to inform employees of their ability to shop for insurance on the Health Insurance Marketplace. Employers must also inform employees that purchasing a plan through the marketplace may cause them to lose their employer contribution to any benefits offered by the employer.

    Requirements for self-funded insurers.

    Employers who offer self-funded insurance plans must meet certain requirements regarding the premiums they charge and the minimum value of the plans they offer.


    The provisions of the Affordable Care Act vary based on a variety of factors, including the number of people you employ and how many hours they work. Understanding how all of these laws affect your company can be difficult. To learn more about the ACA and make sure that your company is complying with all applicable provisions, contact Bender Insurance Solutions. We are experts on the ACA, and will be happy to review your current situation and offer guidance.

  • Key Person Insurance

    Key Person Insurance

    Business Perpetuation, Succession and Key Person Insurance

    One of the primary ways businesses fail is due to poor planning.  It can get so busy in the day to day work, that there can be failure to pause and evaluate the threats that face businesses:

    • Do you have an employee or multiple employees who have a significant impact on whether you succeed or fail as a business?
    • Would your business take several steps backward if a key employee was to leave the organization?
    • If a key employee was to pass away, what type of impact would that have on your business?
    • As a business owner, what happens to your business and your employees if you were to suddenly pass away?

    The answers to these questions help determine the best process of managing your risk.  The goals that you have for your business and your key employees help determine the best way to approach these threats.

    You can use the tools of key person coverage to accomplish your goals such as:

    • Providing life insurance protection on a key employee with a component of cash value that builds for that employee as long as they stay with your organization.
    • Providing life insurance protection on a key employee who is committed to the organization long term, but if they were to pass away would have a catastrophic impact on the business.
    • In a stock purchase scenario, use life insurance to ensure that the purchase will not be stopped by the passing of the purchaser.
    • And a combination of any and all of the above.

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