COMPENSATION AND EMPLOYEE BENEFITS Q&Apm has a comprehensive range of global services that provides a one stop shop solution for companies personnel, management, legal and employee benefit needs. We have a wealth of experience in the employee benefits arena and are able to provide our clients with the best advice and support. Our comprehensive range of services are structured on a modular basis which allows companies to only select the elements you require, either on a regular or ad hoc basis. In this way our clients exact requirements are met safe in the knowledge that, as part of an integrated solution, you can easily expand the amount or range of services in the future. Whatever level of service is selected, an experienced team of advisers, led by a designated Account Manager, will work directly with a company to ensure that: team - We fully understand the Company s corporate objectives and HR strategy - We meet the Company s budgetary requirements - The most appropriate employees from each dedicated service area is selected to form the Our range of Compensation and Benefit services includes the following: - Assistance with the development of a compensation strategy - Review of the market place, including benchmarking exercises - Employee Benefit Surveys - Design and implementation of fixed and flexible benefits and reward packages - Advice on the IT solutions required to support the new benefits and reward package - Implementation and transition from existing advisers and benefit providers - Effective communication support - Administration Support. This covers: - Submission of monthly membership data between the Company and the benefit providers - Submission of monthly data to the Payroll Provider - Processing of new entrants and leavers - Processing of lifestyle events employees who change their benefit selection at pre-designated times - Processing of claims retirement, illness, incapacity, death - Processing of employee details changes addresses, names etc - Annual report processing for P11Ds - Dedicated support for employees should they have any queries that they cannot solve on-line, as required - Ongoing consultancy advice and support i.e. assistance with queries and updates on legislative changes - Review Meetings, as required - Rebroking of benefits to ensure the rates remain competitive - Financial Education and Advice for all staff
As part of the communication and education of a Company s Total Reward package Financial Consultants will be available, as required, for each staff member. This will enable a full individual financial review. This review will naturally encompass advice and guidance on their Company benefits and their long-term overall lifestyle goals and within those goals clear financial objectives. This would be the start of longer term relationship with delivery of Bi-Annual reviews covering:- - Initial know your client meeting (fact find) - Development of future objectives and goals - Preparation of reports and recommendations - Extensive product research - Implementation and administration of appropriate products - Annual cost / benefit analysis report of all non-investment products held - Annual detailed register of all financial products / arrangements held - Direct access to our adviser at any time during business hours - Administration and customer service support - Telephone and email support - Provide information to, and work with other advisers when necessary - Introductions to specialist (as required) On boarding of new employees: We will provide a Client Manager to help with the on-boarding process for new employees. It can be arranged to fit neatly into the induction process. This has the benefits of: Our approach: - Removing the burden of explaining the full suite of benefits from the shoulders of HR - Completing the necessary paperwork to apply for the various benefits - Create a point of contact for all future benefit-related queries - Allow a new employee to ask questions on other areas not directly to do with company benefits, such as preserved pension benefits from previous employers - Moreover, it would take away the onus of responsibility for providing support on all things financial from the HR team and onto Q&Apm. Communication and technical delivery are fundamental elements to ensure a successful implementation of any Employee Benefits Scheme, whether this be a Fixed or Flexible Benefit Scheme, and without getting both correct we believe that the value of the arrangement will be unfulfilled. It is therefore vital that we clearly understand our Client s objectives and have the employees buy-in to the scheme. To highlight how we will meet these objectives our approach is broken down into three phases: Phase 1 Strategy Phase 2 Design and Implementation Phase 3 Ongoing consultancy Advice and Support
The Way Forward: Q&Apm is a Company that is forward thinking and creative and we have a wealth of knowledge and experience in the HR and Employee Benefits arena. We are able offer our clients one dedicated point of contact so you are able to focus on your core levels of expertise safe in the knowledge that your needs are being met on a regular and an ad hoc basis as your business requires. We like to meet with our clients to discuss and understand their needs and attached as Appendix 1 is an extract of some questions that we have been asked when quoting for the design and implementation of new benefit schemes. We would be delighted to meet with you to discuss your requirements in further detail and look forward to hearing back from you. Please call us +44 (0) 845 470 4818 and ask for Nikki Ferguson or Rob Adams or email info@qnapm.com
EXAMPLES OF QUESTIONS FROM PREVIOUS TENDERS APPENDIX 1 Please describe proactive steps that have you have taken to ensure that your customer understands the relevant details of each benefit s policy rules etc. We always ensure that we provide a hand held service. As such, any employee benefit that is introduced is clearly explained to a client. All of the various options are considered and clear communication with regard to this is produced and meetings arranged, where necessary, to explain the benefits in further detail. Processes and procedures are also defined and agreed to ensure the smooth running of the Scheme. We also pre-complete as much of any proposal forms as we can, based on the information supplied, to assist our clients. We have produced Q&A documents to assist both clients and their employees and have produced procedure manuals for the HR team. It is also imperative that the benefits section of any Company produced employee handbook is accurate and up to date. Therefore we have either drafted these sections for clients or reviewed them to ensure they were correct. Within the flexible benefits on line system, all information is available electronically and is accurate and up to date. This not only creates a paper free environment, but also means that all information is readily available to hand and reduces the administration burden for our clients. What assistance do you give to ensure that the customer gives accurate documentation to their staff regarding the details of the benefits offered? The response to this depends on the benefit plan that is implemented. If you take an arrangement such as X s existing benefit package, we ensure that a monitoring log is in place so that when new employees join they have received all of the appropriate documents and forms and conversely they have completed and returned all of the required forms. How this would works in practice is an agreement between our client and us; for example would they like documents to be issued by us directly to the employee s home address or would HR like to receive and distribute. The web based flexible benefits site creates a more efficient platform for control, as this is a paper free environment and all documents and forms are available online. Further any outstanding actions both on the employee s or administrator s part are centrally logged and monitored. An accurate and up to date death benefit nomination form is also a very important aspect. We ensure clients are issuing a form to employees, the wording of the form is accurate and up to date and that they are returned and retained in a safe and confidential environment. Ongoing support and advice is also key and we ensure that our clients have a dedicated Client Relationship Manager who has overall responsibility for the account and provides our clients with one single point of contact. We also like to have regular review meetings with our clients to ensure that everything is running smoothly and you are kept fully up to speed with any legislative and tax changes and topical issues.
Do you provide online information detailing benefits for employees to review themselves? Yes, our web based on line benefits system provides this functionality for both fixed and flexible benefits. How often is this information updated and when was the actual date of the last update? The information is updated once a year through automatic updates and upgrades. With regard to the benefits themselves, the employees get the opportunity to amend their benefits once a year with the exception of a lifestyle change. A lifestyle change is where an employee has either gone through marriage, divorce, separation, the birth of a child or death. In these circumstances, employees are able to re-select the benefits if they felt this was appropriate. What benefits can be included in a Modern Benefits Scheme? There is virtually no aspect of remuneration that cannot be included within a flexible benefits package and these can incorporate (whilst not extensive): - Pensions - Life assurance - Long Term Disability Cover - Critical Illness - Private Medical Insurance - Travel Insurance - Childcare Vouchers - Dental Cover - Health Cash Plans - Buying & Selling of holidays - Bikes2Work - Retail Vouchers - Gym Membership - Health Screening - Payroll Giving - Wills - Travel Allowance - Education Study Allowance - Financial Education & Advice How long have you operated the system and why would you say that it is better that your competitors systems? Our on line system has been operating for over 5 years now. During this time a significant amount of time and resources has been spent in developing the web enabled capabilities; for example the capability to calculate on line the tax and NI implications of benefits selected and to be able to produce Total Reward Statements and Tax statements. It is: - Clear and easy to understand - Easy to communicate
- Paperless environment - Flexible at an affordable cost What added value services do you believe that you offer that other benefits administrators companies do not offer? There are a number of benefit administrators within the market place who offer a comprehensive service but we believe that Q&Apm provides a service that is focused, forward thinking and creative and can make a difference to your business. Q&Apm s defined structure of key employees plus carefully selected quality consultants and Alliance Partners provides us with a wealth of experience and capability to select a strong team that is well placed to deliver the advice and support a client requires. The ability to be able to deliver Financial Education is one area in particular that sets Q&Apm apart from our competitors. Further, our holistic service offering means that we can also offer our clients further assistance within the HR and International arena too. For example: - A review of existing employment contracts to ascertain whether there are any contractual obligations that may create a potential issue if looking to change the existing benefits package. - Support and advice with overseas employees covering issues such as social security, employee benefits and tax issues - Cross boarder benefit comparisons Through this approach we believe we provide a service that can: - Reduce Administrative Burdens - Improve methods of communication - Increase efficiencies - Improve employee appreciation - Improve recruitment and retention - Provide cost control mechanisms Please provide examples of when you have proactively offered suggestions for opportunities for your customers to make financial savings on premiums or the types of benefits offered in the past two years. - Review meetings: As a standard rule we will always review our client s benefits package on an annual basis. This ensures that: - Current suite of benefits is appropriate - Review of providers - Review of the current market environment - Rebroking exercises: We will rebroke schemes at least once every two years to ensure that the rates are still competitive and produce a detailed rebroking report setting out our recommendations.
- Salary Sacrifice: Utilising employer National Insurance savings, where relevant - Proactive communication: We always ensure that clients are aware of forthcoming legislative/ tax break changes and topical issues that could affect them. Can you provide monthly presentations to new starter staff when they join the pension scheme, meet them upon request and at other times occasionally short notice? The short and simple answer is yes. However, we like to do more that meeting employees to just discuss pensions; wherever possible we like to be involved with the on boarding of new hires to explain to them about the whole of their benefits package. This gives the employee a good understanding of their Total Reward package from day 1 and removes the burden of this from HR. We also are able to provide complementary seminars on topics of interest. For example Wills, Mortgages, Long Term Care.