Highlights and Trends in the HRO Market for H1 2013: Part 2

Amy L. Gurchensky, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

Last week, I zeroed in on specific market activity within the payroll, learning and RPO service lines. This week, I’ll take a closer look at H1 2013 activity within benefits administration and MPHRO as well as provide some insights on what to expect in H2 2013 based on NelsonHall’s recent HRO Confidence Index.

Benefits Administration

Contract signings aside, there has been a plethora of activity within benefits administration in H1 2013, including:

• New offerings:
  • Mercer launched a private benefits exchange, Mercer Marketplace
  • Buck Consultants launched an automatic enrollment offering in the U.K.
  • Secova launched a Coordination of Benefits (COB) audit offering to coordinate benefits with insurance carriers
• Acquisitions: Wageworks acquired Crosby Benefit Systems and Benefit Concepts to strengthen its H&W administration offering, including reimbursement account and COBRA administration
• Partnerships:
  • Fidelity partnered with Extend Health, a Towers Watson company, to provide retiree healthcare services
  • JLT Employee Benefits partnered with Vielife for health and wellbeing services in the U.K.
• New technologies:
  • Xerox launched an account-based benefits portal, BenefitWallet, to assist with managing multiple health accounts on one platform, including HSAs, HRAs, FSAs, HIAs (health/wellness incentive accounts) and other specialized services
  • Aon Hewitt launched an absence management tool, 360 Absence Solutions, to help clients manage absence-related costs, compliance risks, the administrative burden and lost productivity
• Educational resources:
  • Mercer and ADP both launched websites to provide information on healthcare reform
  • Ceridian launched an auto-enrollment knowledge center in the U.K.

MPHRO

In recent years, the MPHRO market has been relatively quiet in terms of contract announcements and H1 2013 was no exception. However, my last MPHRO research study, published in February 2013, revealed that the market is very much alive with new wins and contract renewals from all the major vendors, including IBM and Accenture. In fact, IBM recently won a new seven-year, multi-country MPHRO contract, which was bundled with F&A outsourcing services. Other wins include ADP and Marriott Vacations Worldwide for core HR, payroll, time & labor management and talent management covering ~9.2k employees.

Many vendors have been focused on their strategies for expansion, including Aon Hewitt with its acquisition of OmniPoint Workday Services. Although still early, NelsonHall expects ADP to make inroads in LATAM with its MPHRO services since it added RPO capabilities in this region from its acquisition of The RightThing and now expands its payroll footprint from the Payroll S.A. acquisition.

H2 2013

So what does the rest of the year have in store? NelsonHall’s recent HRO Confidence Index survey finds that overall expectations for HRO revenue growth remain at the same level as those reported for the last five quarters; with payroll leading followed by RPO. Top industry sectors for HRO services include healthcare, pharmaceuticals and high-tech. By geography, vendors have reported increased confidence for revenue growth in Central and Eastern Europe and Central and Latin America.

Needless to say, it will be interesting to see how the rest of the year unfolds for HRO.

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Benefits Outsourcing is Blooming

Linda Merritt, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

Benefits administration is producing a bountiful crop of new and expanding services. Recent contract award announcements included ADP, Aon Hewitt, Ceridian, Equiniti, Fidelity, Mass Mutual and Merrill Lynch. A wide range of industry segments were represented: banking; food; education; non-profits; hi-tech; pharmaceuticals; and travel. This week, I have taken a look at some of the newer benefit outsourcing “crops” that are starting to grow nicely.

Managed Retirement Accounts

Fidelity’s relatively new managed retirement account offering – Fidelity Portfolio Advisory Service at Work – was designed to address the low rate of adequate preparation for retirement by many employees by combining Fidelity Investments plan sponsor customized portfolio active management services with auto enrollment and available advisory services to help bridge the gap in achieving retirement goals from a defined contribution plan. The service grew in both participants and assets by 50% in 2012. Already in 2013, another 135 new clients have been added, bringing the total to more than 1,800 plan sponsors.

• Fidelity awarded a contract for Portfolio Advisory Service at Work by ADM.

Health and Wellness

ADP’s Vitality wellness solution supports employers with between 50 and 1,000 employees manage rising healthcare costs and also reduce employee absenteeism. Vitality’s incentive-based program includes an interactive wellness portal, health risk assessments, biometric screenings and personalized wellness plans with recommended goals and activities. It integrates with social networking sites, mobile applications and fitness technologies; and when employees achieve planned goals, they earn points towards lowering their health plan contributions. The service is also integrated with ADP’s payroll services.

• ADP awarded a contract by Jackson Companies for ADP Vitality services.

Benefits Bouquet Bundles

HRO buyers want multiple related services from one vendor under one contract; and health and wellness lends itself to packaging separate services into bundles. Ceridian’s LifeWorks.com combines EAP, work-life, and wellness services into one program with its own portal and mobile access. Also available is Health Coaching – a program for high-risk employees that provides access to comprehensive health assessments and personalized guidance programs – and Client Value Dashboard – included for employers to monitor reports usage data and ROI information.

• Ball State University chooses Ceridian’s LifeWorks.com

Private Employer Exchanges

Mercer’s Marketplace allows employers to improve management of their benefits spending and administrative responsibilities for active employees. Employers determine how much to contribute toward the cost of their benefits program and can select from a range of insured and self-funded products and providers. The platform includes full benefits outsourcing and provides employees with call center and online decision support.

• Mercer recently announced names of 10 of its 20 national, regional and state carriers that have joined Mercer Marketplace for providing core medical and voluntary benefits.

A good garden has a variety of plants. Some base crops are evergreen like benefits enrollment and management services, while others are changed out to meet growing market demand. Benefits HRO: how does your garden grow? Very well thank you.

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HRO Benefit Providers Go Exchange Wild

Linda Merritt, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

Activity is picking up again in readiness for the fall benefits enrollment season with HR benefits service providers adding various types of new health insurance exchanges (HIEs).

New HIE Entrants

Towers Watson has just launched its HIE platform, OneExchange, for employees, pre-65, and Medicare retirees. It builds on Towers Watson’s 2012 acquisition of Extend Health and offers employers both private and public exchange-based health insurance options for full and part-time employees and retirees.

Features include:

• Support from initial financial analysis for employers, to plan comparison, purchase and enrollment, and post-enrollment support and advocacy for individuals
• ExtendRetiree: Medicare-eligible retiree assistance to identify and select supplement health plans from the myriad of available products
• BenefitView: real-time dashboard for employers.

Buck Consultants, a Xerox Company, launched a private HIE, RightOpt, for employers with more than 3,000 employees. The exchange will offer:

• Both a self-funded and fully-insured model
• Personalization based on a family’s health, adversity to risk, and preferences
• Member education, decision-support tools, and health engagement resources.

RightOpt will complement Buck’s retiree HIE, My Medicare Advocate, and will be available for Fall 2013 enrollment.

RightOpt intends to differentiate from other private HIEs by allowing employers to use a national network of providers so employees can access the more deeply-discounted networks of providers by metropolitan area; a model that was historically too administratively complex for many employers.

New HIE Alliances

Fidelity Investments announced a strategic alliance with Extend Health, a Towers Watson Company, to provide HIE services to retiring employees to identify and select Medicare and private health care options through Extend Health.

Fidelity is also expanding its own capabilities to incorporate retiree health care into retirement planning including retiree medical account support services to plan sponsors. Examples include:

• Recordkeeping and reimbursement services
• Retiree workshops and meetings
• Strategic communications expertise.

New HIE Exchanges

Those already in the market, including Aon Hewitt and Mercer, are not sitting still.  Mercer has added Mercer Marketplace, for employers with more than 100 employees, to expand its suite of private HIEs. The exchange utilizes a cloud-based technology platform with call center services and online decision support during enrollment.

Affordable Care Act Will Drive Growth and New Services

Once the final ACA regulations kick-in, there will be even more complexity for both employers and employees. Benefits providers like Towers Watson are already preparing more services to roll out including:

• Connecting workforce segments such as pre-65 retirees, part-time, contract, and seasonal workers to plans offered on public exchanges
• Providing financial analysis, modeling tools, and consulting to help employers decide whether to use private or public exchange solutions
• Enabling employers to transition active employees to exchanges offering individual health plans or group-based plans.

HIEs provide many positive benefits:

• Employers gain help in controlling cost and caring for employee health care needs
• Employees gain access to wider choices at group discounted rates as well as advanced decisions support tools
• Benefits providers can use existing outsourcing capabilities, as well as leverage consulting services and allied services such as Medicare, Medicaid, and the new public exchanges.

No wonder benefits provider have gone HIE wild!

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Kenexa and Aon Hewitt New Product Offerings Help Clients Hire, Engage, and Retain Talent

By Gary Bragar, HRO Research Director, NelsonHall

Kenexa’s RPO business has been growing, including globally as evidenced by its five year RPO contract with Eli Lilly to provide services in Asia Pacific, Europe, and the Americas.

Kenexa has been expanding its business with new service offerings including those focused on talent management. Two new product offerings that help clients hire, engage, and retain talent include:

• Fit Compass
• Career Bull’s Eye.

Kenexa calls these offerings Performance Accelerators.

Fit Compass: helps clients determine the quality of the hire by providing managers with an interview guide to help probe for candidate strengths, work styles, and challenges of how they would fit into the culture of the organization. Fit Compass can also be used for employee development and career planning, team building, and team effectiveness.

Career Bull’s Eye: determines an employee’s level of engagement by assessing their purpose, passion and pay. It then helps business leaders identify where in the organization they need to focus by finding out causes of disengagement so it can make improvements and reduce turnover. It can also be used when onboarding new hires to ensure that they are engaged to avoid turnover. Results are shared during quarterly business reviews with the client. Both products are available as standalone services or can be bundled with other RPO service offerings.

Aon Hewitt provides RPO as both a part of its HR BPO offering and as a standalone service. Aon Hewitt’s RPO business has been growing globally as well. Examples include its HR BPO contract with BP where it provides RPO in North America and EMEA, and its recent contract award with a professional services company to provide RPO as a standalone service in EMEA and North America. Aon Hewitt has two new products that help organizations transform their hiring process:

• SourceSprint
• Digital interviewing capabilities.

SourceSprint: keeps applicants in a talent community for possible placement with other opportunities. Often when an organization fills a job requisition, other applicants are lost after the new hire comes on board. While the applicants may not have gotten the job they applied for, they may be good candidates for other opportunities. But, finding them again is problematic. SourceSprint changes that by using social media, optimization of search engines, and mobile communications to keep these prospects in a talent community. It remembers how applicants were originally found and their preferred communication.

Digital interviewing capabilities: improves the efficiency and experience of the hiring process for both candidates and hiring managers. Through its partnership with HireVue, Aon Hewitt clients can use the HireVue Digital Interview Platform to ask candidates scientifically validated questions that will ensure consistency and objectivity across interviews. Candidates then use a webcam to record their answers. Since it is not a live interview, candidates can respond from anywhere at their convenience, and hiring managers can watch and share the recorded interviews with colleagues anywhere.

Given these types of continuous innovative offerings, it’s no surprise to me that RPO has been rapidly growing as clients seek to attract, engage, and retain talent, while improving the efficiency of the recruitment process at the same time!

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