Description of Template
The Employee Self-Service benefits SharePoint template allows employees to review and enroll in benefits offered by their company. Employees use the site to review the suite of benefits offered by their employer. They may also choose to enroll in a benefit by clicking the ‘enroll’ button listed after each option.
Human Resources teams can use the site to help organize the communication and administration of benefits offered to employees. The site contains fields to list detailed benefit information, including the type of plan, provider, amount covered and link to more information provided in a document that can be uploaded to the site. The site also offers history functionality which enables HR administrators to know who changed the details of a benefit, see what changes were made and revert to a previous version if necessary. The site tracks which employee signed up for which enrollment option and also the time and date the option was selected by the employee.
Activities Performed in this Application Template
- Creation of Plan Types and Provider List: The first step typically taken by administrators is to review the list of Plan Types and create the list of providers. When an Employee Self-Service Benefits site is created, the system automatically generates six common types of benefit plans: medical plans, dental plans, vision plans, flexible spending account, long term disability and 401k plans. These categories help organize the benefit descriptions offered to employees as they sort through the options for each type of benefit. HR administrators can easily change, delete or add Plan Types or Provider Lists within Windows SharePoint Services.
- Creation of Benefit Descriptions: Benefit Descriptions list the actual benefit options companies provide to their employees. HR Administrators use the Wiki functionality to enter the Name of the benefit, type a description and select the plan type, provider, amount covered and cost to employee. The administrator also has the ability to link related documents such as plan details, which allows employees to see all the relevant information about an option at one location.
- Listing of Enrollment Dates: The HR administrator also has the ability to enter deadline dates for the enrollment in benefit options. Using Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer, IT administrators can use this date to lock and unlock enrollment options based on the date provided for open enrollment periods.
- History Tracking and Version Control: Tracking changes made to the Benefits Descriptions is simplified through the use of history tracking. HR administrators can view the changes made to a benefit, who made the change and when the change was saved. Using the links to different versions (1.0, 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0, for example), administrators can view color-coded additions and deletions to a benefit description and choose to ‘restore’ a previous version if the changes are not authorized.
- Employee Option Analysis and Enrollment: Employees use the site to research benefit options offered by the company. The Enrollment Options page lists the name of the plan, provider and information on amount covered. Clicking on the plan link gives the employee additional information including links to documents uploaded by HR detailing the benefit plan. Once an employee has decided, they click ‘enroll’, which adds their username to the list of employees signed up for a benefit option. The employees can view a summarized list of the options they’ve enrolled in and an HR administrator is able to see a complete list of all the employees who have enrolled in a particular benefit.
Site Lists and Libraries
Benefit Descriptions: A library of detailed benefit options offered by the company.
Documents: Provides a library of documents that can be linked to the benefit option.
Enrollment List: A list of benefits and the employees who have enrolled in each.
Plan Types: A list of the types of plans. Six are automatically generated by the template.
Providers List: A list of the benefit providers who work with the company to offer benefits.
Calendar: A calendar used to post enrollment dates to employees.