Technology offers plenty of useful tools to help employee benefits providers service their clients but is it the beginning of the end for human consultants? Charles Goodman has a short answer – and a slightly longer one.
This morning I came to work to no emails. It seems the server fell over in the night and although easily ‘picked up’, I have to wait a few minutes for the backlog of emails to pop through.
As I write, I am reminded that, in the days before email communication became the norm, correspondence was all by post and, while data for renewals is now provided by following sensitive data protocols, in the olden days the data may have been handwritten or on data sheets requiring the manual input at the provider’s end. Alterations to data created a delay in updates to renewals by weeks and the concept of real-time information and valuations was unimaginable.
Not only has technology come a long way in helping to develop how employers provide data, it has also created an opportunity for employers to engage with their staff, ensuring the benefit offering remains understood, used and valued. Today, employees are more likely to want to interact with an online portal than they are likely to want to read the scheme booklet.
Online solutions for financial education and employee wellbeing have popped up over the last few years, enabling employers to offer services to their employees on demand rather than via the traditional presentation route. With the additional feature of being able to track progress and obtain management information from such systems, their benefits appear easily quantifiable.
Flexible benefit platforms have started conversations around the number of products and services that can be offered and, in turn, usually lead to opportunities for additional benefits to be added.
For their part, provider portals – where properly signposted – have meant fewer direct enquiries from members around valuations and changing personal details, reducing administration time for consultants and the client’s operational staff.
The advent of pension freedoms has given retirees multiple options when it comes to taking their pension income, so having an online service that can guide you through these has obvious attractions.
The government’s pensions dashboard will create a facility for individuals to see all of their pension plans, including state pension, in one place, creating the ability for individuals to work out whether they are speeding into retirement or whether the red light is flashing on the fuel gauge.
Software is now entering the market that can, in theory, carry out the traditional consultant role of product broking. Direct digital links to product providers aim to reduce the hassle, with the promise of just clicking a few buttons and your benefit renewal being completed.
These technologies have been – and will continue to be – useful tools in helping us service our clients, but is this the beginning of the end for the employee benefit consultant? Is technology turning from consultant tool to consultant competition?
Dealing with complexity
My simple response is no. Yes, technology can simplify aspects of the administration but I suspect it is a long way off dealing with some of the complexities we find every day within organisations as we audit and review their benefit structures.
Will it recognise the potential lifetime allowance issues created by the group life scheme for the company’s directors? Will it help structure and prepare high-earning employees for annual allowance issues? Can it spot the opportunity to set up a health cash plan to reduce private medical insurance costs?
Will it help the employee who still wants a booklet to read and a person to talk to? Even at a broking level, the offerings I have seen will perhaps remain hindered by the fact they are tied to those few providers who are willing to engage with the software’s suppliers.
Yes, software can produce useful information, but clients want someone who can interpret it for them and help them develop ideas from it. And while it can help engage employees without human intervention on a low-cost basis, most of the employees we deal with appreciate having a human to interact with – particularly when it comes to truly understanding aspects of their finances and wellbeing.
Technology should be seen as a benefit for consultants, freeing us to focus on the importance of helping clients achieve their goals of using benefit strategies to recruit and retain their employees, to support them and, ultimately, to improve their productivity and happiness.
Charles Goodman is an employee benefits consultant at Mattioli Woods
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