Benefits Enrollment Approval for Administrators
How do I approve my employees' enrollment elections?
Purpose: This guide will help benefits administrators learn the enrollment approval process after employees submit their benefit elections.
Overview
Benefits tab
Once employees start submitting their benefit elections, benefits administrators can begin reviewing and approving enrollments from the Benefits tab in the left sidebar menu. This page shows you an overview of benefit information for a specific plan year, including benefit election progress, benefit notifications (not plan year-specific), benefit plans, carriers, and enrollment windows.
Select the applicable plan year and then click # of Elections are Incomplete to find the pending benefit elections you need to review.
You can also use the Plan Years tab to view the progress of employee elections (pending, approved, and incomplete) for a specific plan year.
By default, the Elections tab will show all benefit elections awaiting approval, and you can filter elections by plan year, enrollment window type, and status. Status options include: Approved, Awaiting Approval, and Incomplete (not yet submitted). To begin reviewing an employee's benefit elections, hover your cursor over any employee row and click Review/Edit Elections.
Reviewing benefit elections
Clicking Review Elections will open a page showing all benefit plans the employee has selected to enroll in. If you need to review the plans they waived, select Show Waived Plans in the top right corner. The approval page also has the following information:
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*Dependents: The Dependents table will appear if an employee elected to enroll their dependents in at least one benefit plan. The Updated label will show next to a dependent's name if the employee added or updated their information during enrollment.
- If you need to edit dependent information, hover your cursor over the dependent and click on the pencil icon. Clicking on the trash can icon will delete the dependent, but the delete option will not be available if the dependent is enrolled or scheduled to enroll in a benefit plan.
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A plan or two need your attention: Certain plans will require you to enter cost information (see 401k plan in the example above). In this case, a banner will appear within the Plans section, along with the number of plans that need attention (highlighted). When you add cost information, the number will be updated in real time.
- If you receive a banner stating that a plan is not active on the effective date (selected in the enrollment window setup), you can edit the effective date for that plan on the approval page.
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Enrollment details: Each plan with the Enrolled status will show additional details, such as deductions/costs,** coverage level, coverage amounts (if applicable), and plan effective date.
- If you need to edit the effective date for a benefit plan, hover your cursor over the plan and select Edit from the right corner.
- Edit enrollment details: Click here to learn more about editing a benefit election on the approval page.
- Save & finish later: This option allows you to save your progress and finish reviewing the employee's elections at another time.
- Finalize approval: After all details are reviewed and entered, the Approve Elections button will become green and clickable for approving the employee's benefit elections.
*When an employee updates information about their dependents in the first step of enrollment, the changes will not be tied to the information update approval workflow (if you require admin approval for these changes in BambooHR). Because of this, be sure to review dependent information on the approval page before approving the employee's benefit elections.
**Per paycheck amounts on the approval page are tied to the employee's Pay Schedule and Effective Date fields within their Compensation table.
- If an employee does not have an active pay schedule assigned, the per paycheck amounts will default to the total monthly cost on the approval page. You can review the employee's Compensation table on their employee profile to make sure they are assigned to an active pay schedule (or scheduled to be active at a future date).
- If an employee is a new hire completing benefits enrollment before their hire date and compensation (pay schedule) effective date. You do not need to worry about adjusting the per paycheck amounts as the system will automatically update the employee’s deductions to match their pay schedule once the pay schedule goes active on the compensation effective date.
Editing benefit elections
Change a benefit election
If an employee requests a plan change before you approve their benefit elections, you can do so on the approval page. Find the applicable plan type and select Change Election. A new window will display other benefit plans for that plan type, specific to the employee's eligibility.
From here, you can make the necessary changes by either selecting a new plan or waiving coverage altogether. Click Save to apply adjustments to the employee's benefit election.
HSA and FSA plans: For HSA and FSA plans that require enrollment in specific medical plans, the system will prompt you to make a new HSA or FSA election if you change the employee's medical election to one that is compatible with a different HSA or FSA plan.
Edit a benefit election
To edit details of a current benefit election (labeled as "Enrolled"), you can either click into the benefit plan or hover your cursor over the benefit plan and click Edit. Enter the new information and click outside of the fields to apply the edited information.
Basic life insurance plans
To edit an employee's elected coverage amounts for a basic life insurance plan, click into the plan or hover your cursor over the basic life insurance plan and select the edit option. Enter the new coverage amounts and click outside of the fields to apply edits.
Voluntary life insurance plans
On the admin approval page, voluntary life insurance elections provide the option to automatically move over the requested amounts by clicking on the double arrow.
When reviewing voluntary life insurance elections, you can override coverage amounts outside of the minimum/maximum/increment amounts determined in the benefit plan settings (if needed). Editing coverage amounts for a voluntary life insurance plans is common in the following cases:
- When an employee reaches a certain age, such as 65 or 70
- When an employee needs to provide evidence of insurability (EOI) for higher coverage amounts
- When an employee submits a requested coverage amount that is higher than the guaranteed issue
To edit coverage amounts, go to the plan's details and enter the updated amount in the Approved For field for any necessary coverage levels: Employee, Spouse or Domestic Partner, and/or Per Child. If you do not have this view, simply hover your cursor over the plan and click Edit.
The Approved For field must have an amount for all coverage levels.* Changes made to the Approved For fields will not affect amounts in the Requested fields. Approved For amounts will show up in the Enrollment Window Election Summary report under the Coverage Amount column.
- Approved For amounts will automatically recalculate the Employee Pays cost for age-banded voluntary life and standard rate voluntary AD&D plans. Variable rate plans will need to have that cost updated manually.
- *You can approve an election with $0 in the Approved For field. The use case for this is when an employee is requesting coverage but needs to provide EOI (evidence of insurability) for any amount higher than $0. You will be able to save the $0 amount until the EOI process is completed.
The approval page serves as a historical record of what the employee selected at the time of their enrollment. If you are making changes to benefit plan settings before or after* approving benefit elections, please keep in mind the following results of those changes.
*Additional Note: If you are adding changes (in benefit plan settings or on an employee's Benefits tab) after approving benefit elections for an enrollment window, you will need to communicate any of your employees' updated benefit elections for that enrollment window with your carriers.
Premiums
If you change a premium (cost) after approving an employee's benefit elections, the premium on the approval page will not be updated to the new premium. Instead, the new premium will show up in the employee's saved enrollment, which is visible on their employee profile (Benefits tab > Benefits Overview table).
Coverage options
If you remove a coverage level from a benefit plan, we will alert you of any employees who are using that coverage level. You can edit the employee's enrollment details on the approval page (before approval) or their Benefits tab (after approval) and select a different coverage level.
Plan deletion or expiration
If you delete a benefit plan (or if the plan expires) after an enrollment window starts, the system will remove the deleted plan from any pending employee elections and unenroll the employees who elected to enroll in that plan.
The deleted plan will still appear in the employee's enrollment experience if the employee has not submitted their benefit elections yet. To remove the plan in full, go to the enrollment window setup in Settings > Benefits > Enrollment Windows. Within the setup, uncheck the deleted plan and click Save.
Approving benefit elections
Once all elections are reviewed and have the required information, the Approve Elections button will become available. To finalize approval, click Approve Elections. Another modal will appear for you to confirm your approval. If you need to make any other changes, click Cancel to return to the approval screen.
After completing approvals for your employees, you can run the Enrollment Window Election Summary report, utilize the PDF Form Builder, or activate carrier connections to submit the data to your carriers. Additionally, your employees will receive an email notification letting them know that you have approved their benefit elections.
Once you approve an employee's enrollment in a plan that includes a beneficiary or multiple beneficiaries, you can review beneficiary information on the employee's Benefits tab. Click here to learn more about how employees can add and designate beneficiaries for the life insurance plans they choose to enroll in.
Editing approved benefit elections
If you find that you need to edit or correct an employee's approved benefit elections, navigate to the Benefits tab in the left sidebar menu and select # of Elections Completed. This will bring you to a list of approved benefit elections in Settings.
Hover your cursor over the employee's row and click Review/Edit Elections. Ensure that you are selecting the right enrollment window (whether active or closed) if the employee has elected benefits within multiple enrollment windows.
HR admins can edit approved benefit elections within 30 days of the coverage effective date. Carriers allow up to 60 days for changes. After 30 days, the customer may need to contact their carriers to communicate any further changes.
On the approval page, the following items are available to edit.
- Effective dates
- Dependent information
- Coverage levels*
- Benefit plan changes
- Coverage amounts
Once you complete your edits, click Approve With Changes. The Benefits Admin reports, PDF forms (upon download), and carrier connections (on a weekly basis) will reflect the updated enrollment information.
*When updating coverage levels for an employee's benefit election, you can add existing dependents or remove current dependents. If the employee needs to add a new dependent, create a qualifying life event window for that employee and have the employee resubmit their benefit elections.
Important: If you make changes to approved benefit elections outside of an enrollment window for an employee (using the bulk enrollment feature, the employee profile, and/or the importer), you will need to communicate the new enrollment details with your carriers. The exception to this is if you have carrier connections; in that case, any changes made will reliably send all the required data to your carriers.