Table of Contents
Introduction
Remember, nobody can predict when a medical emergency will occur. No one ever knows when a health-related challenge will occur. In the event of a health challenge affecting a staff member, the productivity of such a staff member drops, at least within the period of this health challenge.
What then happens is that the employer, on the grounds of morality, is slow to disengage the services of such an employee on the grounds that this employee is understandably less productive for that season.
This continues to take a negative toll on the organization since the under productivity of one employee would definitely have a negative effect on the efficiency of the organization as a whole. Funny enough, being in the kind of country we are, where it is quite difficult for people to keep up with savings, it is very likely that a staff member doesn’t have enough money saved up for health emergencies.
The implication of this is that beyond the stress that comes with the health challenge, another stress factor that comes into play is that of the insufficiency of liquid cash to take care of the health challenge.
This then elongates the period of the health challenge and consequently increases the period of unproductivity by the staff causing the company or organization to have a protracted period operating under full capacity.
This makes Health Insurance a must for any company that values productivity and efficiency. We would therefore be considering 7 benefits of health Insurance for Staff members.
The following Statistics pulled from research carried out by professor Ray Merrill, finds that employees with unhealthy habits are causing substantially higher levels of lost workplace productivity.
Ray Merrill asserts that “Total health-related employee productivity loss accounts for 77 percent of all such loss and costs employers two to three times more than annual healthcare expenses,”
Some of his other basic findings include:
- Employees who had difficulty exercising during the day were 96 percent more likely to have increased productivity loss
- Smokers were 28 percent more likely to report suffering from a drop in productivity
- Employees who rarely eat fruits, vegetables and other low-fat foods at work were 93 percent more likely to have a higher loss in productivity
- Those who didn’t believe their workplace would support them in becoming healthier were more likely to have a drop in productivity.
Now this is incredible!
So many employers have never really taken their time to discover how that health-related issues have been the reason for productivity decline in their organizations.
The following are 7 benefits of health insurance for your staff.
Increased Staff Productivity
It has been argued that Increased Staff Productivity is the most important benefit of Health Insurance.
There is a direct relationship between the provision of corporate health insurance for staff members and the productivity level gotten from staff members and there are lots of scientific research to back this up. The research by Ray Merill is a classic example.
Probably because of the reduced psychological burden that comes with medical emergencies meeting empty bank accounts that is prevalent in an economy like Nigeria’s, when staff members have a health cover; a sense of insurance that says ‘whenever, you are sick, just go to the hospital. Don’t worry about the bills. We have it covered’, they tend to have more relaxed attitude towards work.
This is all the more experienced when their dependents (immediate family members) are covered by their health plans. What we find is that, out of gratitude to the company for taking care of their family members, they give their best even during seasons where their family members are hospitalized.
If as an employer, you have never employed the services of grateful employees, then you may want to try giving them an HMO cover. You would then find that the service received from a faithful employee is nothing to be compared with the service received from a grateful employee.
Reduced Cost of Healthcare by Organization
Organizations that go the Health Insurance way get to spend way less than Organizations that do not.
In order to provide care for staff members, some organizations ask their employees to choose hospitals of their own accord, go to access care when needed and then bring the bills for reimbursements (out of pocket payment by the company). This, however opens up the Organization to more costs largely due to fraud.
What some employees do is to make fraudulent arrangements with some health facilities and inflate their health bills in a bid to make some extra cash from the organization. This increases the costs that accrue to organizations from healthcare procedures. And of course, with more costs comes lesser profits.
Again, with corporate health insurance plan, you can actually predict the exact amount of money that your organization would spend on a given expenditure year. This is because you get to pay an exact premium that covers the required health needs of your staff members for a year.
Another benefit of Health Insurance, therefore, is Reduced Cost of Healthcare.
Staff Retention
One of the challenges that Organizations face is that they put in their best to employ quality staff members, maybe even train and re-train them, only to lose them to another company who provides better benefits to them, most especially HMO benefits. Someone once said, ‘If you don’t treat employees right, they will leave. If you treat them right, they will still leave. But, when you treat them right, they would find it difficult to decide to leave’.
Now, that’s profound!
There is no way you can tie down a good employee and stop them from leaving your organization. But hey! You can make it extremely difficult for them to by making them so psychologically comfortable.
What better way to make a person psychologically comfortable than to provide them with benefits that touches the core of their living; their health? You want to record higher staff retention? Consider giving your staff members an HMO plan.
Access to Standard Hospitals
HMOs like IHMS HMO carry out very intense due diligence in ensuring that all affiliated hospitals (providers in her network) operate at highest standards of industry operations. Medically uninformed people may not be privy to information adequate enough to be able to decide what health facilities are equipped enough to provide standard health services. However, with the medical expertise of HMO companies, Hospitals can be optimally assessed for quality assurance and decisions can be taken as regards the standard of the Hospital before those hospitals are then on boarded for partnership with the HMO.
By so doing, staff members are sure to get access to health care in standard hospitals; Hospitals that have been vetted by an HMO company.
Access to Preventive Health Check
The question is that ‘how many people go for regular check-ups?’ How many people go for a diabetes test when they don’t feel a symptom of diabetes? How many people even exercise regularly? How many people go for reproductive health checks when there is no compelling need to do so?
I’m sure you already know the answer to that. Only very few people do those. Yet, only these kinds of checks and preventive health check can truly keep a person healthy. When an individual is at risk of a particular disease, even before obvious symptoms start to show up, he is able to take steps to ensure the prevention of the occurrence of such symptoms or at least be guaranteed of early detection of such symptoms. It is general knowledge that prevention is better than cure. Likewise, early detection can also guarantee absolute cure in most cases, if not all.
The beautiful thing here is that HMOs like IHMS carry out these Preventive Health Checks for free. Yes. For free.
The implication of this is that when you sign up for an health insurance plan with IHMS, your staff members begin to enjoy regular health screenings, access to gyms and spas (for exercise), access to weekly health education talk sessions that helps you and your staff better optimize their health as one of the benefits of Health Insurance.
Access to Preferential treatment in Hospitals
How do you think Hospitals would treat you when they are certain that a financial institution is covering your bill?
Well, Well… I am sure we are both thinking along the same lines.
You would obviously be treated like a king and a queen.
This is what you give your staff when you give them a health insurance plan.
It is one of the benefits of Health Insurance.
Corporate Health Insurance Certificate
A Corporate Health Insurance Certificate, submitted alongside your tax documents, gives you some sorts of reduction in your taxation. Corporate Health Insurance can be itemized under your allowable deductions or your Corporate Social Reductions (CSR) and these gives you reduced taxes.
Thinking along the same lines? Great!
This is one of the benefits of Health Insurance for Corporates.
Conclusion
The Importance of providing employees with medical coverage cannot be over-emphasized. If you are still unsure, why not browse through the policies yourself? You could also speak to one of our representatives by dialing the phone number in the header above.