Whereas open enrollment continues to be months away at most employers, now’s the time for HR leaders to use learnings from final 12 months that may make the 2026 profit choice interval extra profitable.
HR leaders and advantages groups could not know what’s conserving staff from specializing in their advantages selections, however they do know that is an costly enterprise. The Kaiser Household Basis 2025 Employer Well being Advantages Survey paperwork that common household premiums reached $26,993 in 2025, a 6% improve that outpaced wage development of 4%.
The report additionally discovered that staff are contributing a median of $6,850 towards household protection. The common deductible for single protection has climbed 43% during the last decade, now sitting at $1,886. These numbers present that advantages selections require time, focus and the flexibility to ask follow-up questions.
Nevertheless, listed here are a number of the pitfalls that reared their head throughout open enrollment final 12 months, every a sign to HR leaders about what would possibly want to vary for this 12 months.
Profit questions occur across the clock
Greater than 20% of advantages questions arrived exterior commonplace enterprise hours, with practically 10% extra coming in on weekends, in response to a brand new report from HR service platform Cascade AI, which analyzed 1000’s of anonymized worker questions requested throughout open enrollment this fall. The analysis discovered that staff had been tending to enrollment selections at evening, on cell gadgets and within the margins of their day.
Greater than an FAQ is required
When Cascade’s AI gave staff an nameless, always-on channel to ask no matter they wanted, the character of the questions modified. Cascade discovered that 59% of periods concerned 4 or extra exchanges with staff constructing on earlier solutions, testing situations, and circling again.
One worker requested 59 questions in a single sitting, working by means of HSA mechanics, vital sickness situations and household protection choices in sequence.
Learn extra: Employers have helped rein in healthcare prices, however the combat isn’t over
Value considerations trigger anxiousness
KFF requested employers how involved they believed their staff had been concerning the affordability of advantages. Solely 20% of enormous corporations believed staff had a excessive degree of concern concerning the affordability of value sharing.
Nevertheless, Cascade’s behavioral information tells a special story about value fears. “Workers ran worst-case math again and again, stress-testing what occurs when issues go incorrect, in response to the report. “They’re anxious about making the incorrect name.” Workers expressed considerations about managing a number of specialist visits, a high-cost prescription or a service change that disrupts current care relationships.
Community transitions aren’t simple
KFF analysis supplies context for why the transition anxiousness Cascade documented is rational quite than uninformed. Eight % of corporations provide slender community plans, and practically one in three employers acknowledges gaps in well timed entry to psychological well being companies.
When an worker is questioning late at evening about whether or not their therapist continues to be lined underneath the brand new plan, they don’t seem to be being unreasonable, as a result of community modifications and entry gaps could make protection continuity unsure.
The character of questions is altering
Cascade additionally tracked a year-over-year change within the character of worker questions. In 2024, staff requested foundational questions comparable to what advantages had been and the way they labored. In 2025, they arrived able to resolve, asking which plan made sense for his or her particular household, their particular childcare prices and their particular tax scenario. Well being plan comparability questions grew from 38% to 55% of all exercise in a single 12 months, in response to the report.
KFF’s information helps clarify what staff could also be considering. The unfold between common PPO and HDHP household premiums is sort of $3,000 yearly. Selecting appropriately requires mapping particular person healthcare utilization onto every plan’s deductible, out-of-pocket most and cost-sharing construction.
Cascade discovered that when staff had entry to a software that might cause by means of their circumstances, they used it, they usually stopped defaulting to final 12 months’s plan. Whereas this examine was produced by a vendor with a industrial curiosity within the final result, that is nonetheless perception that HR leaders can use even when they don’t use a brand new software throughout subsequent 12 months’s open enrollment.
“The following frontier for AI in open enrollment isn’t answering extra questions,” in response to Cascade’s report. “It’s closing the space between understanding and motion.”
