CUNA Mutual Group has teamed up with HR resources firm Enwisen to create MyCUbenefits, an HR and benefits administration portal that offers CU staff 24-hour customized access to their benefits packages.
Prior to working with CUNA Mutual, Enwisen had only a few credit union clients because the firm's offerings were cost prohibitive for the vast majority of credit unions, according to Enwisen's Barry Maxon.
"We really weren't focusing on the credit union market until now because most credit unions simply couldn't afford our service," Maxon told The Credit Union Journal. "Because of the deal we have with CUNA Mutual, credit unions get the benefit of volume pricing."
The HR portal will allow CU employees to access the employee handbook and get their benefits-related questions answered 24 hours a day seven days a week. Not only does this provide convenience to employees, it's also a matter of confidentiality.
For example, an employee interested in looking up the benefits offered for substance abuse problems or domestic partner coverage, explained Maxon. "There are some things people just aren't willing to go to an HR about," he added.
Just as beneficial: the portal access can free up a lot of time for the HR department, allowing a credit union to streamline costs in this area.
The service has been in beta testing for several months and was officially unveiled at CUNA Mutual's Discovery Conference.
"The concept was to bring the tools available at a large, Fortune 500 company to the credit union movement," said Tom Eckert, SVP-pension operations at CUNA Mutual.
"It also helps facilitate the move to an increasingly paperless office," added Bob Stubbe, VP-employee benefits at CUNA Mutual. "That's particularly important for a small credit union, where the CEO often is the HR manager, and they're not hiring people every week, so they don't have the expertise in this area, even though they have to do it themselves. This gives them 'sleep insurance' because now they'll have a checklist to make sure they're going through the whole process correctly."
One such checklist is the life events section of the portal. It takes an employee through all the HR-related processes that are triggered by such events as marriage, divorce or the birth of a child, for example.
The site is co-branded, with the premiere brand being that of the individual credit union, and small, "understated" CUNA Mutual Group logo in the bottom left corner.
"CUNA Mutual Group really wants to make this the credit union's site," Maxon commented. "Many insurance providers have a web benefits offering, but it is centered around their own products. CUNA Mutual Group has been product-neutral, provider neutral, and that's a really key difference."
MyCUbenefits will be offered in three different tiers that are priced according to the level of functionality.
The basic level is a turn-key package that offers fast installation and access to employee data, carrier plan descriptions, carrier links, six life-event checklist options, educational resources and calculators, news and information, reporting features and other HR-related content.
A one-time set-up fee of $10 per employee (with a minimum of $500) plus an annual access fee of $2,000.
The "plus" level offers more customized and additional content, including an employee announcements section, internal job postings, 21 work/life events and the "quick poll" tool which allows HR to conduct employee surveys in a flash. For this second tier, the one-time set-up fee is $20 per employee with a minimum of $1,000 and an annual access fee of $5,000.
The "premiere" level is still being developed for credit unions seeking a more integrated package that would include such tools as automated benefits enrollment, payroll and automated forms processing. Maxon suggested this third tier could be anwhere in the $10,000 to $30,000 range, depending on the needs of the credit union.
