Benefits Optimization Review

Is your current benefits structure creating an avoidable payroll tax expense?

The Benefits Optimization Review evaluates whether your current payroll and benefits structure presents an opportunity to reduce employer payroll-related costs through tax-favored benefit strategies.

We quantify the financial opportunity before asking leadership to evaluate a solution.

Tax-Favored Benefits Optimization

The Reason to Look

There may be an optimization opportunity hidden inside your payroll.

PayrollBenefitsTax TreatmentEmployee Eligibility

Healthcare and employee benefits represent a significant operating expense for many employers. But the cost of the program is not limited to premiums and claims.

The interaction between payroll, employee demographics, benefit elections and applicable tax treatment may create additional opportunities to improve the economics of the benefits program.

The BOR evaluates that opportunity before recommending a solution.

What is the opportunity worth?

Rather than beginning with a product presentation, the analysis begins with the employer’s own data and develops a preliminary estimate of the potential financial impact.

Financial Impact Statement

Turn the opportunity into a number.

The BOR develops a preliminary Financial Impact Statement designed to help leadership determine whether the opportunity is financially significant enough to warrant further evaluation.

Preliminary Financial Impact

Illustrative Example — Not Actual Client Results
Employees Analyzed
850
Potentially Eligible Employees
720
Annual Payroll Analyzed
$42.8M
Potential Annual Employer Financial Impact
$214,000
Estimated Impact Per Eligible Employee
$297

The purpose of the Financial Impact Statement is not to recommend implementation. It is to determine whether a sufficiently meaningful financial opportunity exists to justify further analysis.

The Benefits Optimization Review and Financial Impact Statement are provided for preliminary analytical and illustrative purposes. Estimates are based on information supplied by the employer and assumptions applicable at the time of analysis. Actual eligibility, tax treatment, compliance requirements, program structure and realized financial results require additional review. Nothing presented constitutes tax, legal or accounting advice. Employers should consult their appropriate tax, legal and accounting advisors before implementation.

Decision Gate

Is the opportunity material enough to pursue?

Not every optimization opportunity deserves implementation.

If the preliminary analysis does not demonstrate meaningful value, the process can stop there.

If the Financial Impact Statement identifies a material opportunity, leadership now has a financially grounded reason to move to the next stage of evaluation.

The role here is to diagnose an opportunity, not to advance a predetermined solution.

BOR Analysis
Financial Impact Identified
Is the opportunity material?

No → Stop

Yes → Validate with Subject-Matter Team

Leadership Decision

The Process

Diagnose before you prescribe.

  1. 01
    Analyze

    Evaluate employer payroll and benefit information to identify whether a potential tax-favored benefits optimization opportunity exists.

  2. 02
    Quantify

    Translate the preliminary opportunity into an executive-level Financial Impact Statement.

  3. 03
    Validate

    If the financial impact is material, engage specialized subject-matter expertise to validate eligibility, assumptions, tax treatment, compliance considerations and program structure.

  4. 04
    Execute

    Only after the strategy and economics have been validated does leadership determine whether moving from diagnosis to implementation makes sense.

Analysis first. Solution second.

Next Step

From financial diagnosis to strategy validation.

When the BOR identifies a meaningful financial opportunity, the next logical step is a working session with the specialized team that would support the strategy.

Tax-Favored Benefits Subject-Matter Team

Brian's role

Identify and quantify the opportunity.

Subject-matter team's role

Validate and explain the strategy.

Employer leadership's role

Determine whether the economics and strategy warrant execution.

The purpose of that conversation is to:

  • Validate the preliminary financial analysis
  • Determine employee and employer applicability
  • Explain the tax-favored benefits structure
  • Review applicable compliance considerations
  • Evaluate payroll integration
  • Explain the employee experience
  • Review implementation requirements
  • Determine whether the strategy makes financial and operational sense

Tax-favored benefits optimization is one analytical module within the broader Benefits Optimization Report methodology.

Explore the BOR Process

Next Step

Find out what the opportunity is worth before evaluating a solution.

The Benefits Optimization Review provides leadership with a data-led way to determine whether tax-favored benefits optimization represents a meaningful financial opportunity for the organization.

Learn whether a Benefits Optimization Report makes sense for your organization. No cost. No obligation.

Analyses, projections, benchmarks and modeled scenarios are intended to support benefits strategy and decision-making and may rely on assumptions, available data and third-party information. Actual results may vary. The Benefits Optimization Report™ does not constitute legal, tax or medical advice.