Employees plan to spend more time reviewing their benefits during open enrollment
Survey also reveals 70% interested in support to optimize benefit dollars
Sep 22, 2022
As open enrollment season approaches, Voya’s latest consumer survey reveals that inflationary pressures have American employees increasingly focused on their employer-provided benefits to help optimize their workplace benefits and savings needs.
The survey found that the majority of employed individuals (70%) agree they plan to spend more time reviewing their benefit selections during open enrollment to help make the most of their benefit dollars because of inflation.1
However, to help employees make more informed benefit decisions for their unique personal circumstances, many may need some help. The new survey also revealed that 7 in 10 employed Americans (70%) are interested in receiving support to help optimize their benefits dollars across retirement savings, health-care insurance, health savings accounts (HSAs) and voluntary benefits like critical illness, hospital indemnity, disability income or accident insurance.1
“Voya’s new survey reveals that nearly three-quarters of Americans (74%) agree that inflation has made them more stressed about their personal financial situation, which is up from 66% in March of this year,”1 explained Rob Grubka, CEO of Voya’s Health Solutions. “And, with the fall open enrollment season approaching for millions of Americans, it’s encouraging to see that workers intend to carve out more time to focus on reviewing all the workplace benefits offered by their employers to help optimize every hard-earned dollar.”
Balancing today’s needs, tomorrow’s goals
The challenge for many individuals in the current landscape is understanding how to balance their short-term needs with their long-term financial goals. For example, when asked what concerned them the most, almost 9 in 10 surveyed Americans (88%) said it was the various impacts of inflation — such as the rising cost of food and groceries (38%), rising gas prices (35%) and the rising cost of housing (15%). Interestingly, the rising cost of health care ranked fourth on this list of top concerns (9%), followed by the rising cost of streaming and TV services (3%).1
“At Voya, we recognize that making informed decisions about your workplace benefits and savings needs can leave many employees feeling unsure as to whether they’re making the right choices,” said Andrew Frend, SVP of Strategy and Product, Voya Health Solutions. “For employers and benefits providers, this presents a tremendous opportunity to work together to help simplify and personalize the annual enrollment experience so employees can act with confidence in how they allocate their next dollar.”
On-going education and tech tools critical
In addition to year-round education and communications efforts, innovative solutions and technology tools can be a game-changer, according to Frend. For example, Voya recently launched myHealth&Wealth™ — an integrated digital guidance tool that helps employees optimize their household spending across health insurance benefits, supplemental benefits, emergency savings and saving for retirement.
“This technology-enabled, interactive experience helps employees think about their benefits contributions and savings as a total ‘benefits budget,’ while providing a personalized action plan,” noted Frend. “Voya has plans to continue enhancing our solutions and capabilities to help individuals optimize their decision-making — which, ultimately, can help lead to improved outcomes.”
Other ways Voya is innovating for a better future
In addition to myHealth&Wealth, Voya has launched several innovative solutions to help employees holistically plan for their health and wealth needs, with more integrated experiences scheduled to launch this year.
Plus, Voya is focused on transforming financial care in the workplace by helping employers realize greater value by getting their workplace benefits and savings in sync — to boost employee engagement, save time and help improve outcomes by simplifying decision making.
Voya’s latest perspectives paper, “The future of workplace benefits starts with a connected experience,” explores how the proliferation of comprehensive benefits designed to meet the different needs of four generations of workers requires employers to rethink how they deliver and manage employee benefits. Employees are also seeking a seamless and integrated workplace benefits and savings experience to help them meet their holistic financial wellness goals.
Want to learn more about syncing your workplace benefits and savings? Visit voya.com/futureofbenefits.
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1. Based on the results of a Voya Financial survey conducted June 17-21, 2022, on the Ipsos eNation omnibus online platform among 1,005 adults, featuring 495 working Americans aged 18+ in the U.S.
Ipsos is a separate entity and not a corporate affiliate of Voya Financial®.
Products and services offered through the Voya® family of companies.
Please review the disclosures in the MyHealth&Wealth Terms, which outline the criteria and methods behind myHealth&Wealth, including limitations and assumptions to consider when reviewing the output of the tool. Results may vary over time due to regulatory and/or tax changes, as well as changes in your health and/or financial situation.
Voya Financial and its affiliated companies (collectively, “Voya”) is making available to you the myHealth&Wealth tool offered by SAVVI Financial LLC. (“SAVVI”). Voya has a financial ownership interest in and business relationships with SAVVI that create an incentive for Voya to promote SAVVI’s products and services and for SAVVI to promote Voya’s products and services. Please access and read SAVVI’s Firm Brochure which is available at this link: https://www.savvifi.com/legal/form-adv. It contains general information about SAVVI’s business, including conflicts of interest.
The myHealth&Wealth tool provides information and options for your consideration regarding, among other things, Supplemental Health insurance policies. Because Voya sells Supplemental Health insurance policies as part of its overall Health Solutions business, you should consider the conflict of Voya’s ownership interest in SAVVI when considering the Supplemental Health insurance policies myHealth&Wealth highlights for your consideration. You are under no obligation to purchase any benefits highlighted by the myHealth&Wealth tool, and most such benefits can be purchased or excluded on an individual basis. You are not required to purchase Supplemental Health insurance to enroll in healthcare coverage.
The myHealth&Wealth tool provides information and options for you to consider in making healthcare, health savings, emergency savings, and retirement savings choices. Those choices are solely up to you to make. myHealth&Wealth does not provide you with fiduciary advice with respect to your plan elections and contributions. None of SAVVI, Voya, nor WEX Health acts in a fiduciary capacity in providing myHealth&Wealth or other services to you; any such fiduciary capacity is explicitly disclaimed.
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