Creating and Managing Benefit Classes for a Client

Purpose

A benefit class is a group of employees who get the same benefits deal: the same plans, the same contribution split, and the same waiting periods. Full-time and part-time, hourly and salaried, or head office and field staff are typical classes. Every proposal reads its eligibility from the client's classes, so classes need to be right before you build the proposal. This article covers creating, assigning, editing, and deleting classes.

Who can do this: the client's broker, their agency, and account managers linked to that broker. Your client's administrators can also manage classes from their own portal (Benefits > Manage Benefits Classes), so agree class changes with them. Their side is described in Managing Benefit Classes: Deciding Which Employees Get Which Benefits.

When to create a class

• Two groups of employees get different plans, contributions, or waiting periods.
• A group joins from an acquisition and keeps a different package for a while.

If every employee gets the same deal, you do not need extra classes. Every client always has one default class, and a single-class client needs nothing more.

Create a class

1. Go to Clients, open the client's page, and click the Manage Classes tile under Core Operations.
2. Click Create New Class.
3. Enter a Class Name and Class Description. Employers see the name, so make it meaningful, for example Full-time hourly.
4. Choose a Class Criteria category, then the matching value. For example, employment type = full-time. Leave criteria out to create a class you assign employees to by hand.
5. Click Create Class.

You can also rename the system-generated Default class to something that fits the client.

Use a custom field as the criterion

To class employees by something UZIO does not hold as a standard field (for example, a job type), add it as a custom column in the employee census file, fill it in, and upload the file. The field then appears in the Class Criteria list. A custom field appears only once at least one employee has a value in it.

How employees get their class

• Explicit assignment wins. If you or the client choose a class when adding an employee or in the census upload, that class is used.
• Criteria assign the rest. If no class is chosen, UZIO matches the employee against each class's criteria.
• One class only: new employees go into it automatically.
• More than one class: UZIO does not guess. If an employee matches no class, or matches more than one, you are asked to choose before the record saves. This applies when adding an employee on screen and in a census upload.
• Profile changes are re-checked. When an employee's profile is edited, UZIO checks whether the change qualifies them for a different class. If it does, the new class is assigned and a notice appears when the profile is saved.

Two proposals at once

When a client has two active proposals (for example, this year's and next year's) with different class structures, an employee's class must exist in the relevant proposal. If it does not, adding the employee is blocked with an error. Choose a class that exists in the proposal. The class saved is the one from the later year's proposal.

Edit or delete a class

• Edit changes a class's criterion or value. Click Update Class to save.
• Delete removes a class.

You can edit or delete a class only when no employees are assigned to it and it is not linked to an active proposal. Move the employees to another class first.

Classes and proposals

Each proposal carries its own set of classes. Inside a proposal, the class decides:

• Which plans the employee is offered.
• The contribution split. See Choosing a Contribution Strategy for a Client's Health Benefits.
• The waiting period for each benefit.
• At renewal, which replacement plan the employee moves to. See Renewing a Client's Benefits.

To add a class to a live package (for example, after an acquisition), see Changing a Proposal After It Has Been Shared. Classes cannot be added while open enrollment is running.

Common problems

Why am I asked to pick a class when saving an employee? The client has more than one class, and the employee matches none of the criteria or more than one. Choose the right class. This is expected: UZIO no longer drops such employees into the default class.

Why can't I edit or delete this class? Employees are still assigned to it, or it is linked to an active proposal. Reassign the employees first. A class in an active proposal stays until that proposal ends.

An employee sees the wrong plans. Check the employee's class in the census against the proposal's class setup. If the class is wrong, correct it, then reset the employee's enrollment so they see the right plans. Your client's side of this is covered in Viewing Your Benefit Proposals.

My custom field is not in the criteria list. No employee has a value in it yet. Fill it in for at least one employee and upload the census again.

Related articles

• Building a Benefits Proposal and Sharing It With Your Client
• Choosing a Contribution Strategy for a Client's Health Benefits
• Managing Employer Custom Fields
• Your client's view: Managing Benefit Classes: Deciding Which Employees Get Which Benefits
• Your client's view: Viewing Your Benefit Proposals