Transcript for "BrokerConnect Virtual - Product Enhancements":
Good morning. Good afternoon, broker community. My name is Ben Cody. I'm the divisional vice president of broker sales at TriNet. And today, we have a few exciting things that we're gonna go over. We're gonna talk about some product developments. We're gonna talk about some service enhancements and process improvements. But before we get into that, I wanna go over a little bit of housekeeping, and then I also wanna give you some insight what I've observed in the market as of late and how that is impacting us and some things to look out for. So number one is, on the I think it's probably your right hand side of the screen, you're gonna see different links that you can click into. So some of the information I go through today, you can click onto that, and you can pull that information, extract that information out so you can read a little bit deeper, on each of these pieces. The other thing, I'm gonna keep this to about twenty minutes. We're not gonna do q and a at the end. We have a lot of folks that can't, tune in for the exact time, so they get the recording. So I'm gonna keep it pretty tight to twenty minutes. But what I'd encourage you to do, if you have any questions, please reach out to your broker relation manager or the sales consultant that you work with or both so that you can talk through some of the items that we're gonna go through today. And then you can figure out from a, from a dialogue standpoint how you can best, approach different prospects and clients to sell them on some of these enhancements because I think it's gonna be advantageous to you and advantageous, to them. So now let me give you a little bit of market insights, and then we're gonna get into the, the content of the presentation. So what I observe so a little bit quick background. I've been in the PO space since 2007. I've been with TriNet since 2014. And I have seen over time and and and more so, in the past few years, the the great adoption from the broker community, that is increased exponentially, year over year. But what's most profound, I think, is what the even the recent adoption and what I've noticed in the market is, so why are brokers like yourself, why are you participating? Why are you in this call? Why are you engaged more in the PO prospect, process? We're you're seeing you're identifying and understanding the value that it provides to clients. Other people are getting into the game as well. So there is a, sometimes a defensive play. Sometimes, you know, if I don't bring it up, somebody else will bring it up. It's staying on the cutting edge of what's new. It's trying to get ahead of high renewals in different markets and just bring some innovation to a market which can get stale over time if you're offering the same product. So what we've seen is a massive adoption across national, regional, and local, retail agencies where you have PO practice leaders that were never there before. You have regional leaders that are dedicated specifically to the PO space. GAs are getting in the game that have sat, on the sidelines, for years. And you have PEO brokers, which are popping up all over the country. And I think that might be one of the greatest indications of the demand in the market. They are people aren't setting up shop and becoming PEO brokers because it's it's a debt business. They're getting into it because there's lots of demand to satisfy out there. So these are all the things. Now how that's impacting TriNet at the moment. So if I just go back to 2022 and I do a little bit of a a graph here on RFP volume into TriNet, and I'm sure that other PEO competitors are experiencing the same thing because of this adoption, you've had this trend line from 22 to 23 RFPs, like your submissions just from the broker community, '22, '23, '24, '25, and '26 has been like this. We have seen almost double the RFP volume in the activity from you as a broker community than we ever have before year over year, it's the most I've ever seen before. So what you may have experienced in the past thirty days is a little bit of a slower quote time. Now we haven't always been the fastest game in town with quoting. We try to get it right. We try to be precise. Right? So that can take a little bit more time than some of our competitors who do it a little bit quicker. But we've been even a little bit slower than that. So I'm calling out the why. It's because the man lit like this. We have a little bit of a log jam, but we've loosened the log jam. So what I think you're gonna see in the upcoming days and weeks is we will be as good or better than we ever were before. But if you have experienced that, that's the why behind that experience. But, good problem to have. We work through it, and you're gonna see something different going forward. So let's get into the, content for today. First, we're gonna talk like I said before, we're gonna do some product development, service enhancements, and process improvements, and you can see some of the items there on the page. I'm not gonna read it out, but let's get into it right now. So first is curated benefits. Now what does curated benefits mean? That is a nice and interesting way to say just benefit bundles. So in order to describe the benefit bundles that you're going to see with for one one effective dates and after, depending on the market where the employees are in, you're going to see maybe five plans, maybe 10 plans, maybe 20 plans. And as we get into the areas where there's more plans, some of the 20 plans. And as we get into the areas where there's more plans, some of the feedback is, hey. This is challenging for me to digest, for me to explain, for them to under understand, and then the employees to make decisions. So as a result of that, what we've done is we've created these benefit bundles. So what will happen now in the new world, all that information comes in. Then we take that census information. We take the current plan lineup. We take, you know, information from you, working with the sales consultant and broker relation management. What do they wanna see going forward? And then we have a curated benefit bundle based upon that to address the need of where they are today and where they want to go. And that benefit bundle will have six plans. Now a logical question to that would be or response would be, well, what if I don't like the bundle? Fair question. So if you don't like the bundle, we have other bundles that you can look at and you always have the ability to opt out and go back to the way we have been doing it the way you have experienced, which is all the plans. But what I'd recommend is be open minded to it. We've had brokers in the pilot. Some of you may have been in the pilot. We've had a lot of direct clients in the pilot, and everybody has absolutely loved it. Not only does it simplify and make it absolutely loved it. Not only does it simplify and make it easier from a decision making standpoint, easier for you to explain, employer to understand, employees to make decisions, but it also helps with getting with, getting closer to creating a more competitive offering with more stable renewals. And this is why you have when you have all those options on the table, you can have some inherent risk to plan selection. Right? The way people are selecting plans and what the biases are and that and then how that impacts the risk. So with the bundle, benefit bundles, that mitigates that, which allows us to get to a more aggressive price point and then greater predictability. So there's a lot of benefits, no pun intended, to the benefit bundles, but please be open minded, look at it, but I told you what you can do if for whatever reason you absolutely feel that it you can't sell it. So that ties into our, also, our national rates. So, again, to understand national rates, let's talk about where we are to, where we were yesterday. And by yesterday, I mean, the way we were quoting before, but if you're getting new quotes for effective date of October 1 or after you're seeing national rates. So one of the complaints that we had or areas where it's like, you know what? You guys can we could do this a little bit better is our regional rate structure. So in the regional rate structure, the way that look, if you had this plan and the same plan in a different, in a different state, different area, you could have two different rates. Now that was challenging for you, one, from a standpoint of analyzing, two, putting on a spreadsheet, three, to do a cost analysis for the employer, and then maybe the employer is like, hey. Why does Bob get a different price than me just because I'm in a different state? So now we have national rates. And what it means, exactly what it sounds like, you have the same plan. You're gonna have the exact same rate irrespective of the geography, so the exact same rate. There are only a couple exceptions with Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield that we have out of Pennsylvania and with, Kaiser with different north and south region in California. But other than that, one rate, same plan design, same rate. Now even with that national rate, so you have simplicity, you can explain it, people can digest it, which is good, but then you also get greater precision on the underwriting because there's a few dynamics that go into this. One is we are zeroing in at the ZIP code level, right, because it's not that you're getting the price in the highest in the highest jurisdiction that wouldn't be a great national rate structure. We're zeroing in on the ZIP codes. We're taking into account behaviors, excuse me, costs such trends like pharmaceutical costs and then also demand in that market. What are the conditions? And then we're using that to build that national rate. So what we're seeing, early innings, what I'm seeing on these 10 ones is very, aggressive is probably not the right word, plans that are very competitive. It makes sense. They're easy to explain. People like them. So if you haven't seen them yet, you're going to see them as you request ten one effective dates, and beyond. So the now we wanna get into some of the voluntary benefits. And life and LTD, STD, it's something that we've had with MetLife for a few years now. I mean, I can't even I'm trying to remember back to when it was in MetLife. But for one one effective dates, a lot of these changes you see are one one. We're gonna move to Unum. Unum is a top tier, insurance carrier. Phenomenal, underwriting capabilities, unbelievable operations, and they're gonna be fully integrated. So for net new business with one one effective dates thereafter, you're going to see, Unum there. We also have two, additions to the Aflac product line, which you can see there as well. And we also have identity force, which is, it protects your personal identity. That's now available. It's always been available, but now it's gonna be available through open enrollment and renewal. I personally am identity force. I think it's fantastic. And in the age of AI and you can't tell what's real and what's not real, I think it's fantastic. I highly recommend it, but that's just a personal plug. Cocoon. This I'm gonna spend a little bit more time on this because I think this is fantastic. And, again, on the side of your screen, you can see where you can download the information. So Cocoon is one of the greatest product enhancements, that I've ever seen in my time at TriNet. And we're talking about leave. Right? So leave whether it's parental leave, personal leave, military leave, medical leave, caregiver leave. There's all these leaves. Right? Statutory leaves. And when you go on leave and what Cocoon does, it is a lead management technology that we pair up with our leave of apps and software. A lot of you have been using this independent before it was acquired by TriNet. You just use this. And why is leave so critical? You as the broker get tapped for this a lot of times. But when we're on leave, when employee goes on leave and this falls under employee benefits and what they're gonna come to their the decision maker for and and ultimately what will come to you, you are stressed. There is a life event that is make making you step away from work. Hence, you have less cognitive capacity and function to figure this out. And it is the most archaic system that I've ever seen before this. You have federal, state, local laws that are changing. People are trying to figure out what their options are, what their benefits are, what the documentation is, when you have to fill it out. It's a freaking disaster. People complain, and you're stressed. You can't do it. So what Cocoon does, it has and I think the only way to really sell it is I'd recommend everybody call their broker relation manager or sales consultancy a demo. So I'm gonna simplify this to the best of my ability just from a user. And as a user of it, not I'm not on lead, but I went through the whole demo is you take, and I've seen employees screenshots of trying to follow multiple email threads and figure out this date and scroll back five days and look at this one and they talk to their employer and they go nuts in the process, it brings everything together. So you're looking at you have approvals, you have denials, you have entitlement, entitlements. You have the benefits paid. You have milestones. You have exactly what you need to do and by what date, and you can access it right there. The employ administrative employer can see it as well, and they can act as proxy. It makes life significantly easier. I recommend that everybody get a demo on this. Understand it. We're gonna put more information out about it. But I think this alone could stand alone as a product because it's that freaking good. So moving on from there, I wanna talk about some things that Mike Simons, our CEO, has said before. If you listen to our quarterly reports, if you listen to our annual reports, if you heard some of the demo I mean, the, webinars he's been on before. He wants to be the number one destination for brokers, and he's serious about this. And I'm serious about this, and the team is serious about this. And the only way you get there is you gotta make improvements every single day and get a little bit better. So one of them has been is our broker notifications for renewals. So let me tell you the way it was, the way it is now, and the way it's moving into right as a result of this. So the way it was before, you were lucky if you've been doing business with us if we got the renewal to you about three days before your client saw. That was a great day. We were thrilled if we got it to you three days before. Now we're two weeks where we get to the information for two weeks. You can digest it. We're gonna discuss it. We can strategize, and that's fantastic too. And now we're gonna couple that activity of engagement with a proactive email communication to you. So the second that the benefits, the renewal becomes available in our, benefit service site, you're gonna get a note notification that's gonna prompt you to go into our portal, which you're gonna be be able to access it. And that's gonna be a minimum of two weeks before your client ever sees it. So, that coupled with, again, us engaging strategy, discussion, what do we wanna do, what we're trying to get a little bit better every single day and do things that are gonna help you make decisions. The other thing that we have, and this isn't gonna load into the partner portal right away, but we have forecast reports. And if you haven't experienced this already, we are giving you a preliminary view five months in advance, about five months in advance of the renewal so you know what's coming down the pike. We can see if there's gonna be some outlier that they're just they're running hot. We can see what groups are running well. We don't have to spend a lot of time on it, but it gives you that it it just gives you visibility. If If you wanna look at your business that far in advance, which is great practice, we can give you that visibility into it. Again, little bit better every single day. That's the goal here and that's, in service of Mike's vision of the number one, partner for brokers. So now I wanna talk a little bit about our HR ASO updates. So let me let me define the products for TriNet, and I'm gonna talk to you a little bit about this. Navigator's gonna be part employee navigator is gonna be part of this discussion. So with TriNet, what what people know is TriNet for the most part and what we think of PEO is what it is, is the co employment solution, everything wrapped together with these master medical plans. And that's great. That's our core. That's one of the best value, values and services we can offer to clients in the space today. Close cousin to that is when we call it open market solutions where maybe the medical you have level funded. Maybe there's a carrier in the marketplace that we don't have that you want. Maybe we have to DTQ it for whatever reason. The open market is the only viable option. Then we pair up open market plans with the PEO chassis. Great. Wonderful. Great solution. But then we also have ASO, and that is decoupling the coemployment. There's no risk sharing, but you get a lot of the same HR of putting into one word. PO is proactive. ASO is reactive. PO is proactive because why? We share risk. It's our plans. It's our legal team. It's our infrastructure. Everything is ours, but we're sharing it as a as a co employer. So we're gonna prompt you. We gotta do this. We gotta do this. This is the best interest. We're gonna be out there as a proactive entity person relationship that helps you stay in compliance. Whereas ASO, it's all there, but you have to pull it out. I need this. I wanna look at this. You gotta update me on this. You gotta pull it out rather than it coming at you. So we have this ASO product line. It's a fantastic service. It has payroll too. We just don't promote it out there like, some of our competitors, and we have a Ben admin tool associated with it. So the Ben admin tool, if you use the homegrown Ben admin tool that we have, acquired, homegrown, and developed, right, it's probably a better description, we've added, the capacity to do additional supplemental insurance lines. So rather than reading through it, if you're looking at the sheet right now, everything in bold, so bottom of the first column, all the second column are now addition, additional supplemental benefits that we can integrate through our Ben admin platform. Everything that was unbolded was what we had, before. So great enhancement just allows you to bring business to TriNet. We're paying you on that business. We pay you in the PPM the same as we pay you in the PEO. Right? So you're making money every single month in perpetuity if you bring these deals to us, and it adds an, additional lines. Now that we have 30 plus lines, that can be managed with the supplemental coverage. And now what I think you're really gonna enjoy is employee navigator. We have made mentions of this in press releases, at Broker Connects, if you've been listening some posts that we've had. But if you haven't been paying attention to that, we are integrated with employee navigator. So what that allows you to do is, again, you have employee navigator, I'm sure, with a lot of your companies, they're plugged into the various carriers. Maybe they're plugged into payroll. You can plug that into our a, our ASO platform now. That company needs that overlay, that HR service compliance support. Again, it's going to be on a reactive because it's not PO, it's not co employment, but they can plug into that. They can plug into our payroll. If you make that referral over, we charge a PPM. We're gonna pay you for it, and everything can be integrated. So, you know, my view or my hope for you as a broker community, the way you see TriNet is you don't see us as a one trick pony. Right? Now we're three trick pony, but we have you think of us as, hey. I have these I have need my clients have needs. The needs change. A client that's like this today maybe won't be like this tomorrow. So maybe they want PEO today, but then PEO is not the right fit, so they need just an ASO solution. Or maybe they need just they need a PO, but they need outside benefits. Whatever it is, TriNet has a solution. My dream is that you see the solution that way. That way, you don't have to manage multiple companies with multiple points of contact and figure out what you're gonna do. But we can we can service that and allow your client to ebb and flow the way companies do. Companies have maturations. They have they declined to, and we can manage those different life's, life cycles with those various clients. Again, all this information folks, you can sign a screen, but then I I recommend you also reach out to your broker relation manager, your the sales consultant you work with, or feel free to reach out to me because we'd love to have these discussions. And the last thing I wanna leave you with is two things. Excuse me. Two things I wanna leave you with. I want two more things. One is we have various, spiffs going on right now. So you all should be aware of the spiffs, which I don't have on which the other ones I don't have on the screen today. But if you don't know about them, then you should reach out immediately, because we don't wanna leave money on the table. But this is an additional one. So if you have a group and it's in the process with us right now, and if this group sign runs payroll by December 31, so it could still have a January 1 benefit effective date potentially. But they run payroll by December 31, and you had them do a demo where the client prospect attended, which is pay an extra $5,000. So we're proud of our demo. We don't we have proprietary technology. We do not white label. It's fantastic. We invest a heck of a lot of money in it. We encourage people to see it. The more people to see it, I think you'll see all the value add from that standpoint to key differentiator. So you run-in a process. It's good to run that part that in the process anyways. You do it. They sign paperwork. Fantastic. They attend the demo an extra five thousand dollars for you. And lastly, we've done 16 broker connects around the country, this year. Got a last one coming up, in October, and that is in Boston. If you were in the market, we would love to see you. Team will be up there. All the regional teams and folks from my team, we love to see you and participate there. We have bringing, people from around the area, different speakers, different panels, and it's just a great, a great event. And that concludes. Again, folks, I'm not gonna do q and a today, but I do recommend reach out to your broker relation manager, sales consultant. Feel free to call me, and we're happy to answer any questions. And I appreciate your business. Thank you very much.