86% of employers see returns on overlooked benefits

A new Inc.com report puts a hard number on a question most HR teams leave unanswered during open enrollment: 86% of employers see a payoff from three benefits that rarely headline the annual sign-up conversation.

That figure reframes open enrollment itself. If nearly nine in ten employers generate measurable value from under-promoted benefits, the problem is not plan design — it is plan communication. Employers are already paying for these offerings. Most employees simply never elect them, because enrollment materials lead with premiums and deductibles.

The statistic carries a direct implication for HR teams currently mid-cycle or planning for the next one: the return on underused benefits is being left on the table. Closing that gap is a people-process decision, not a procurement one.

What does the 86% figure actually change?

It shifts the benchmark. For years, benefits teams measured open enrollment by completion rates and cost-per-employee. The Inc.com finding suggests a third metric belongs alongside them: utilization of the benefits already purchased.

For most organizations, that means reworking three things before the next enrollment window:

• Communication sequencing. Premium comparisons dominate the first email. Benefits with demonstrated employer payoff rarely appear until employees have already made their selections.
• Manager enablement. Frontline managers field most benefits questions. If they cannot explain an overlooked benefit in one sentence, adoption stalls regardless of what HR publishes.
• Timing. A single enrollment-week push competes with dozens of competing deadlines. Sustained messaging before and after the window moves election rates.

Why adoption — not selection — is the real test

The 86% figure cuts both ways. Employers who see the payoff have presumably cleared the adoption hurdle. Employers who do not are still carrying the cost of benefits their workforce ignores.

That gap between spend and realized value is the capability question benefits leaders should bring to vendors and brokers this cycle:

• Which of our current benefits have election rates below 20%?
• What communication support does the vendor provide beyond a PDF?
• Can we measure utilization change year over year, by benefit?

Vendors that cannot answer the third question are asking employers to accept the 86% payoff on faith rather than evidence.

The open enrollment window is a listening tool

Enrollment season also produces the year's richest dataset on what employees actually want. Election patterns, help-desk questions and abandonment points in the enrollment flow all signal where benefits communication failed — and which overlooked offerings employees would use if they understood them.

HR teams that capture that data now can build the case for next year's portfolio with evidence instead of assumptions.

What to watch next

The Inc.com finding suggests the benefits conversation is moving from cost management toward value realization. Expect more employers to treat underused benefits as a measurable communication problem — and to demand utilization data from carriers and vendors that, until now, few have been asked to produce.