Flexible Spending Accounts and Employee Engagement

On this week's program, host Doug Field is back in the studio with special guests from Visa and Benz Communications for discussions on flexible spending accounts, employee engagement and more. 

The first guest is be Renee Lutzen, Senior Director of Healthcare at Visa. In this interview, Renee and the hosts discuss a new survey from Visa and WageWorks that found 60 percent of employers opted to offer a health care FSA with a carryover option this year -- up from 49 percent just a year ago and more than double from 2013. These employers agree the health care FSA carryover option -- now in its third year -- is also driving employee participation. The survey provides a year-over-year look at the growth of employer selection of health care FSAs, featuring the carryover option, and what employers see as the biggest benefits and barriers to employee participation.

For the second segment, Jennifer Benz, CEO and Founder, Benz Communications, a boutique benefits communication firm, joins the program to discuss the findings of a recent survey on employee engagement. Benz Communications recently released a joint national survey with Quantum Workplace that gathered responses from more than 2,000 U.S. employees, revealing that too often workers miss out on meaningful cost conversations with medical providers -- talks that could mean the difference in millions for employers in claims costs. In this interview, Jen walks through the survey’s top-line findings and offer strategies to achieve effective employee engagement and create employees who are truly capable and confident health care consumers.