Open Enrollment Checklist: What to Review Before Renewing

Mar 11

Open enrollment season is one of the most important — and most overlooked — moments in the benefits calendar. For many employees, it’s the only time during the year they can make changes to their health, dental, vision, and ancillary coverage. For employers and HR teams, it’s an opportunity to evaluate whether your benefits package is still competitive, cost-effective, and aligned with the needs of your workforce.

But too often, open enrollment becomes a checkbox exercise — “Renew everything the same as last year” — without a meaningful review. That approach can cost your organization money and leave employees underserved.

At Affinity Risk, we believe open enrollment deserves a strategic, eyes-open review. Here’s a checklist of what to examine before you sign on the dotted line.

1. Review Your Claims Experience

Before renewing your health plan, request a claims utilization report from your carrier or broker. Understanding how your employees actually used their benefits over the past year is the foundation for every other decision you’ll make.

• Were most claims in-network or out-of-network?

• What were the top cost drivers (specialty drugs, chronic conditions, ER visits)?

• How does your loss ratio compare to prior years?

• Are there departments or demographics with unusually high utilization?

This data shapes your renewal negotiation and helps you determine whether a plan design change — like shifting to a higher-deductible plan with an HSA — makes sense.

2. Benchmark Your Benefits Against the Market

Are your benefits competitive? Employees have more leverage today than they did five years ago, and a weak benefits package can hurt recruiting and retention even if your compensation is strong.

Compare your offerings against:

• Industry benchmarks for your sector and company size

• Regional norms (benefits packages vary significantly by geography)

• Competitor offerings, if you have visibility into them

Your Affinity Risk advisor can provide benchmarking data to help you understand where your plan stands and where you have room to improve.

3. Evaluate Employee Satisfaction and Engagement

A benefits package that employees don’t understand or use isn’t doing its job. Before open enrollment, consider a quick pulse survey or review any feedback from last year’s enrollment period.

Key questions to ask:

• Do employees feel they have adequate health coverage options?

• Are there benefits being offered that no one uses (and could be replaced)?

• Is there demand for benefits not currently offered — mental health support, fertility coverage, pet insurance, student loan assistance?

• Did employees understand how to use their benefits last year?

4. Check for Compliance and Regulatory Changes

Benefits compliance is an area where gaps can be costly. Open enrollment is a natural time to confirm that your plans remain compliant with current federal and state regulations.

Items to verify:

• ACA affordability thresholds and minimum value requirements (updated annually)

• Mental health parity compliance

• State-mandated benefit requirements in the states where you operate

• COBRA and HIPAA notices

• Summary of Benefits and Coverage (SBC) distribution

5. Scrutinize the Renewal Pricing

Your carrier’s renewal offer is a starting point for negotiation, not a final answer. Before accepting a rate increase, ask the right questions.

• What is driving the increase — trend, claims experience, or market factors?

• Are there plan design changes that could reduce the premium without significantly impacting employees?

• Should you go out to market and get competing quotes?

• Is your current carrier offering value beyond the premium (wellness programs, care navigation, data tools)?

Even a 1–2% reduction in premium on a large group plan can represent significant annual savings. Don’t leave money on the table.

6. Review Ancillary and Voluntary Benefits

Health insurance gets most of the attention during open enrollment, but your ancillary lines — dental, vision, life, disability, and voluntary products — deserve the same scrutiny.

• Are your dental and vision networks robust enough for your workforce location(s)?

• Is your life insurance benefit (employer-paid and voluntary) competitive?

• Are short-term and long-term disability benefits structured appropriately?

• Are you offering voluntary products that provide real employee value, like critical illness, accident, or hospital indemnity insurance?

7. Plan Your Employee Communication Strategy

Even the best benefits package fails if employees don’t understand their options. Open enrollment communication is often the weak link in the process.

Before enrollment opens, plan:

• A clear enrollment timeline with deadlines

• Easy-to-understand summaries of plan options (avoid jargon)

• Decision-support tools (cost calculators, plan comparison charts)

• Manager briefings so frontline leaders can answer basic employee questions

• A way for employees to get personalized help — whether a benefits hotline, HR office hours, or an online chat tool

The Bottom Line

Open enrollment is too important to treat as a formality. It’s a chance to control costs, improve employee satisfaction, ensure compliance, and position your organization as an employer of choice. Taking the time to work through this checklist — ideally 60 to 90 days before your renewal date — can make a meaningful difference.

At Affinity Risk, our advisors work alongside HR and finance teams throughout the renewal process, from claims analysis to carrier negotiations to employee communications. If you’d like a fresh set of eyes on your upcoming renewal, we’d be glad to help.

Contact your Affinity Risk advisor or reach out to our team to schedule a pre-enrollment review.

Chris Jones https://www.cciustn.com