Group Benefits Consulting
Supporting healthier, happier, more productive teams.
Having a dedicated team is integral to success, making employees one of your most important business investments. Offering a comprehensive employee group benefits package can help you attract and retain top talent in Canada’s competitive hiring environment.
Your guide to group benefits.
We partner with you to build custom benefit plans that provide clear, certain and comprehensive protection for your most valuable resource – your people. Together, we’ll ensure your long-term peace of mind.
When designing or modifying a group benefits program, here are some things to take into consideration:
- Your organizational goals
- Your organization’s budget
- Your employees’ needs
- Your employee demographics
- Usage trends and benchmarks
Find our benefits advisors across Canada.
Get in touch about your group benefits plan by phone or in person at your nearest branch.
Building a group benefits package for your employees.
Designing a group benefits package is a flexible process. You’ll be able to choose from numerous options to create a plan that caters to your employees’ collective needs while also aligning with the size and budget of your company.
Life Insurance
This type of coverage provides your employees with life insurance. In the unfortunate event that they should unexpectedly pass away, the employee’s designated beneficiary will receive a sum of money. This can help employees protect their dependents and reduce financial struggles due to the loss of income.
Accidental Death and Dismemberment Insurance
This type of coverage is similar to life insurance but is designed to pay in the event of an accidental death. This will additionally help support the employee’s designated beneficiary and there are also payout options for dismemberment of a lost limb.
Critical Illness Insurance
This can help reduce the financial burden when someone is diagnosed with a serious illness such as a heart attack, cancer, organ failure or blindness. Medical conditions covered by critical illness insurance will vary depending on the individual insurer.
Disability Insurance
If an employee is disabled and unable to work due to an unexpected illness or accident, disability insurance can help replace a percentage of their income. This may apply to temporary and permanent disability situations.
Extended Healthcare
A group health insurance plan is a cost-effective way for employees to get extended health insurance coverage. This can extend provincial healthcare benefits or include coverage for professional services like massage therapy, physiotherapy, psychologists and more.
Dental Care
Dental care is often not covered by provincial healthcare so even routine dental care can be very expensive. It’s generally a very desirable benefit for employees. Group dental insurance is broken down into three categories – basic, major, and orthodontic – and you can choose the best one for your team.
Health and Wellness Spending Accounts
Employees have access to a fixed dollar amount to spend on health and dental expenses that are not covered under provincial health care as well as general health and wellness expenses. These can include things such as gym memberships, sports equipment, personal and professional development, and more.
Employee Family Assistance Plans
Employee Family Assistance Plans (EFAP) provide staff and their dependents with the support they need to work through various professional and personal challenges. Common professional services offered can include counselling services, childcare, and financial assistance.
Why choose Acera Benefits?
No matter the size of your company, Acera Benefits can design, implement and manage a group benefits plan to help keep your employees healthy and productive. We help you maximize the return on investment while supporting your employees and their futures.
Independent & Employee Owned
We are committed to building strong, lasting relationships and always operate with our client’s best interests at heart.
Tailored Solutions & Complete Coverage
We build customized solutions to protect our client’s most important asset— their people. We provide clarity, confidence and certainty for our clients.
Seamless Extension of Your Team
Acting as an addition to our client’s team, we deliver cost-effective programs that truly align with our client’s goals plus direct access and personalized support.
Helpful tips from our benefits advisors.
Acera Benefits brings decades of experience designing and administering benefits solutions for hundreds of client organizations across Canada. We consistently communicate advances in products, legislation and the evolution of group insurance, wellness, pension and human resources programs.
Answering your most common questions.
What are group benefits?
Employee benefits are provided in addition to normal earnings to help employees and their families offset living costs, and support total health and wellness. Compensation packages are becoming increasingly more complex. In today’s world, employee contracts are made up of a variety of benefits.
Examples of benefits within a package may include:
- Health insurance, dental insurance, and health spending accounts (HSAs)
- Retirement benefits and profit-sharing
- Wellness benefits (such as reimbursement for gym memberships or race registrations, weight loss programs, and smoking cessation) and well-being benefits (such as access to coaching, or meditation and fitness apps)
How can group benefits help grow your business?
The success of your business relies on talented and productive people. Employee group benefits supports your business growth by:
- Attracting top talent: HR surveys consistently show group benefits are a major factor for individuals considering a job offer.
- Improving operational efficiency: Providing affordable and accessible group benefits can help you maintain a healthy and productive workforce.
- Creating tax savings: In most cases, employee group benefits are tax-deductible for your business.
- Saving time: Having Acera Insurance design, implement and maintain your group benefits plan will save your HR team valuable time and resources.
Why do group benefits matter?
Benefits are important to employees because it shows them their employer is invested in their overall health and wellness. Benefits are a non-wage form of compensation that can have a direct impact on employee retention and recruitment.
Benefits can help employers differentiate their business from competitors. Understanding what benefits are important to your unique group of employees is the first step in creating a competitive advantage when recruiting new talent for your organization.
How much does it cost to offer group benefits?
Costs will vary greatly depending on many factors such as the size of your group, the average age-weighted volume, and the amount of coverage you implement.
When designing the benefits program, employers can use strategies to limit or contain costs long term. These may include building deductibles or co-insurance into the coverage, or ensuring there are maximums in place to manage ongoing claims experience. Year over year, your rates will be renewed on an annual basis. Depending on the package you design, some of the benefits will be claims experience rated at renewal, and some benefits will be fully pooled.
What factors should be considered when designing a group benefits package?
There are a few factors that determine your group’s insurance need.
- Pooled plans spread the risk among a larger group. This can provide a stable and cost-effective way for small- to medium-sized businesses to offer a competitive benefits package to their employees. This offer is available for as low as one employee.
- Traditional plans allow for a more tailored plan design where employers pay a monthly premium to cover the anticipated costs of their program claims, which at renewal will be calculated based on previous claims history and the carrier’s trend factors.
- Modular plans help businesses manage costs while offering a flexible benefits plan in which their employees can select from different packages to get the coverage that best aligns with their needs.
An Acera Benefits advisor can help you determine the option that is right for your business based on your number of employees, group demographics, historic claims patterns and budget.
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