Ten Tips to Help Employees Maximize Their Workplace Benefits in Today's Economy

NEW YORK, Oct. 29 /PRNewswire/ -- The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America (Guardian), one of the largest mutual life insurance companies and a leading provider of employee benefits to midsize and small companies, offers employees and employers tips for leveraging their employee benefits in one of the worst economic environments since the Great Depression.

Guardian's employee benefits experts compiled these money saving tips and educational resources just in time for the fall open enrollment season when millions of employees make important decisions about their benefits for the coming year. Additionally, Guardian recently launched an educational campaign including a dedicated Website and enhanced enrollment services to make it easier for employers to manage and employees, to understand and select their benefits.

Open Enrollment Tips

    Sign-up for voluntary benefits
       1) Consider taking advantage of voluntary benefits (sponsored by the
          employer, paid by the employee).  They give you greater choices and
          discounted access to benefits to help ensure protection needs meet
          your specific lifestyle.  They are usually more affordable than
          individual coverage and require limited or no medical underwriting.
       2) Sign up for voluntary benefits earlier rather than later. Some
          voluntary benefits like life insurance plans may automatically
          increase coverage amounts each year, building up greater coverage
          than what you initially signed up for. These increases have no
          impact to premiums so it pays to enroll early.

    Look for the freebies or perks
       3) Use your health insurance plan to get a discount on your gym
          membership.  Health insurance plans with a wellness focus often
          offer these discounts to encourage employees to stay fit, keeping
          your long-term costs of care lower.
          Need estate planning or will preparation advice? Check your life
          insurance coverage to see if free or low cost legal services are
          available.  For example, Guardian has WillPrep Services* that give
          plan members access to online planning documents and professional
          assistance with advanced health care directives, estate taxes,
          financial and healthcare power of attorney, guardianship and
          conservatorship, trusts and wills.

    Keep more money in your pockets
       4) If a high deductible health plan is one of your medical plan
          options, consider opening a health savings account if available.
          Money in HSA funds build tax-free and you keep it even if you change
          jobs. You can use the money to pay for qualified health expenses if
          necessary and if no health care needs arise, you are building your
          money up on a tax-advantaged basis.
       5) All high-deductible plans are not created equally.  Look for a plan
          that doesn't require you to pay out-of-pocket for common
          preventative screenings. Critical illness insurance can be bundled
          with your health plan to provide greater coverage when serious
          illnesses strike. A new industry feature on critical illness
          insurance is a hospital rider where if you face an extended hospital
          stay, you can receive a check of up to $500 for each day you're in
          the hospital -- up to ten days.  You can use the money any way you
          want, but many employees choose to use this extra cash to cover high
          deductibles, co-payments, or even child care.

    Use it, don't lose it
       6) Look for a dental plan that has an annual maximum rollover -- these
          newer plans became popular in the past three years and allow you to
          roll over a portion of your unused benefits to the next year.  These
          plans are doing for the dental industry what rollover minutes did
          for the mobile phone industry.
       7) Consider signing up for a flexible spending account which allows you
          to pay for qualified healthcare, dependent care and even
          transportation expenses with before-tax dollars. It's a use it, or
          lose it account so don't forget to use the money before the year-end
          deadline.  Qualifying purchases may include: medical and dental
          deductibles and copayments, over the counter medications, eye
          glasses, child care, and transportation related to your employment.

    Don't give up on your 401(k)
       8) Open Enrollment is a really good time to take a look at your company
          retirement plan contributions.  With only a few short months left in
          the year, you have time to make adjustments, if necessary, to ensure
          you reach your contribution goal.
       9) Now is the time to start up contributions again, if you stopped
          contributing during the market turmoil earlier this year.  Saving
          through your employer-sponsored retirement plan helps you
          automatically follow one of the wisest investment strategies--dollar-
          cost averaging, putting the same amount of money in the same
          investment consistently, regardless of market movement.  Over time,
          this can reduce the overall cost of your investments.

    If you lose your job, keep your benefits
      10) If you lose your job, some of your benefits may be portable.  Make
          sure you ask your HR executive about the ability to maintain key
          benefits at affordable group rates in the event of job loss.

Guardian Educational Campaign and More Tips

Guardian's Web page www.guardianenrollmenttips.com, offers free online tips, an interactive benefits quiz and resources for employers and their employees. The company is also sponsoring a radio awareness campaign this fall to encourage employees to spend more time learning about their benefits.

"In the midst of economic downturn employers are looking to effectively deliver competitive benefits programs that fit their budgets and meet the diverse needs of their employees," said Elena Wu, Group Marketing Officer, Guardian. "Voluntary benefits and plan designs that offer value for the benefits buck are increasingly becoming important vehicles for helping employers to strike that delicate balance between controlling expenses and keeping their employees motivated and happy with quality employee benefits. Guardian is committed to giving midsize and small employers and their workforce greater access to not only benefits, but also education that will help them to make better decisions and be more competitive with larger companies."

Guardian's services designed to relieve the administrative burden for employers and improve employee understanding and management of their benefits include:

• Customized enrollment success plans designed to increase employee participation to help employers communicate benefit offerings through on-site enrollment meetings and turn-key employee communications.
• Bilingual enrollment services including Spanish language enrollment materials as well as in-language phone support.
• Personalized enrollment kits available to plan sponsors that offer voluntary life or disability insurance, where the employees' names and addresses are already filled in on their enrollment forms and cost information is conveniently displayed and personalized based on employee's age and salary making the enrollment decision easier.
• Employee online enrollment available to eligible existing Guardian customers after initial enrollment, gives plan sponsors the option of allowing their employees to update and select their benefits directly using the Internet if they are a new hire or re-enrolling.
• Face-to-face enrollment meetings with our nationwide team of benefit advisors at no extra cost.
• Toll-free employee benefits hotline where support is available in over 50 languages.
• 24/7 access to Guardian's online benefits website, Guardian Anytime, which includes provider locators, health resources, glossaries and plan information.
• Guardian's WorkLifeMatters Employee Assistance Program that offers support on a range of matters such as elder and child care, retirement planning and stress management.
  

*WillPrep Services are provided by Integrated Behavioral Health, Inc., and its contractors.

About Guardian
A mutual insurer founded nearly 150 years ago, The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America and its subsidiaries are committed to protecting individuals, business owners and their employees with life, long term care insurance, disability income, group medical and dental insurance products, and offer 401(k), annuities and other financial products. Guardian operates one of the largest dental networks in the United States, and protects more than six million employees and their families at 120,000 companies. The company has more than 5,400 employees in the United States and a network of over 3,000 financial representatives in more than 80 agencies nationwide.
For more information about Guardian, please visit: www.GuardianLife.com