Recruitment Retention Revenue: Insider Opportunities in Employee Benefits with Tanner Gardner

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Just from our relationships in the insurance world, we actually got into the PPE industry. That industry was a complete sham. There was a lot of fluff in that industry to say to these, a lot of people saying, hey, I could sell you these masks, I could sell you these gloves. So that was a whole another rabbit hole. And then once that kind of died down summer 2020, I just really dove into insurance. And insurance is all about relationships. ["What You Need Now"] You're listening to the Radcast, a top 25 worldwide business podcast.

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If it's radical, we cover it.

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Here's your host, Ryan Alford. What's up guys. Welcome to Right About Now. This is Ryan Alford, your host. I'm pumped today. We used to say if it's radical, we cover it. Well, I like.

00:45
The four Rs, you know, like we were talking about the three Rs, Tanner, but you know, look at the four Rs. We're still radical. But, uh, I got Tanner Gardner here, VP of business development, innovative health insurance advisors. If you give me one word, more words to say, Tanner, I don't know if I can do it. It's a mouthful. Thanks for having me. Great to be here. Bro. It's been great getting to know you better and pumped that you're here in the studio. Absolutely. You know, one of our, uh, we've been getting a lot of guests, a lot more guests in studio. Beautiful. Right. South Carolina. Come and visit. South Cackalacky. It's a beautiful spot.

01:15
I never this might ironically first time ever in South Carolina. It's a wonderful state man beautiful You know good place to raise a family right right near the mountains near the coast right you know You probably get some good oysters out here. Yeah, really good. That's awesome. So it's fun, man, but glad you're here Yeah, likewise thing and look we got a lot of business owners a lot of entrepreneurs. Yeah listen to the show and

01:38
you know, kidding with the four R's, but we, but I'm pumped to talk about the three R's. Right. I think for any business owner and myself owning multiple business, you know, when we started talking like topics for the day, I was like, these are like the key things completely. You've got retention, recruitment, revenue. Yep. You know, three big things. So I know today we wanted to get into like, OK, it's twenty twenty four. Yeah.

02:02
What are the trends? What are the things? What are ways that you guys, you know, with your company, but you being a leader in the field, and I know how respected your firm is, you know, we want to just want to give value to the audience about things we're seeing. You know, how can business owners out there.

02:19
recruit better, retain better, and grow their bottom line. 100%. Let's just start there, man. What are you seeing? What's the climate in your field and in this space overall? Insurance in general is very interesting. And maybe it would be beneficial just to kind of give a lay of the land. So at HeartWare, TPA, so third party administrator of group health insurance plans, are really.

02:42
main focus of business is something called ACA compliance or MEC plans. It's basically, hey, once you're a business owner, you have 50 employees, you need to offer what's called minimum of central coverage. If not, the IRS is gonna come for you and you're gonna get penalized. So- We don't want that, people. We do not want that. So if you're not ACA compliance, get ACA compliant. So that's our bread and butter. That's what we're known for. We're the nation's largest provider of ACA compliant plans, MEC plans across the United States. But everything we do just as a company-

03:07
is really trying to think outside of the box as far as health insurance goes. They give ways to, you know, mitigate costs, help out with that retention recruitment, right, because insurance in general, right. It's the one guarantee every year that you know is going to go up. Hey, I just met with my broker. Sorry. You saw it never go down. Very rare. Only in some cases, if you're if you're self insured, where that's a whole another whole other number of employees. I just don't think it ever goes that ever goes down. Right. And for an employee, right, it's it's becoming more and more.

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unaffordable, right? Because if I'm a I'm your regular employee making 1520 bucks an hour, right? I could barely afford 600 bucks a month for a high deductible plan. And you talk about that high deductible plan, God forbid I go to the hospital that bankrupts people right? It truly I go into debt, right? Because any medical bills, even if I go to the ER, right?

03:55
hospitals, right, they also write the narrative. So when I go to the hospital, they're going to send me a bill for 20 grand for getting an x ray, right? It's a it's a joke. So everything we do is trying to, you know, mitigate that change really the narrative and really shift the, you know, narrative how insurance is typically

04:12
driven and how it's typically modeled into a kind of new model. And that's kind of what sparked our encompassing health program. And, you know, the the main basis behind the program and why we kind of came into this market is really just because COVID really impacted all of our clients. Right. Especially 90 percent of our groups are those blue color industries, your construction and management, hospitality, nursing, agricultural, where even prior to COVID as a business owner, they worked on tiny.

04:38
margins, right? And then post COVID hit, like, oh, my gosh, I got to shut my doors down. I had no revenue for eight months. How can I reopen? Right? And so that's kind of what sparked this program. And basically what it is, it's a it's a section 125 is basically the concept behind it. Section 125. It's been around since 1978. It's most commonly used tax in the United States. Every business owner has it for

05:00
you know, their major medical pre tax deduction for one case, the byproduct of having a pre tax deduction could potentially be a savings in FICA is kind of the byproduct of how that works. So with our encompassing health program, how it's structured is basically employees will get access to additional benefits for them and their entire family at no out of pocket costs. So there is a cost associated with the program, the cost is just taking kind of from the tax savings that's generated. But now employees will get access to

05:27
products like a hospital indemnity plan, right? If Hey, God forbid, I do go to the hospital. Now I'm going to get paid XR amount for being fine, be admitted being transported, they'll get access to also additional benefits for them and their entire family for stuff like a virtual primary care to behavioral health. So these are all elements we can kind of dive into. But yeah, it's been a really great story to tell because every business owner is looking for that solution to not only write

05:51
address that retention recruitment through benefits, but also have kind of the byproduct of potential savings for both employer earn employee. And I'll say this, you know, I've owned, you know, I worked for others. I feel like I've always been an entrepreneur in some ways. But I worked for others 15 years, I've owned multiple companies for six, seven years now. And it's, I don't know why it surprised me. But

06:15
you with recruitment and retention and how important insurance and how big like I knew it so it's like I don't want to play like I was an idiot. I mean, I think I was naive coming into it as a business owner as I started having 5, 10, 15 employees. Like, okay, I knew insurance mattered, but the degrees, the levels and the amount of options that can be there and how it can make or break certain hires because you might, if you want certain talent.

06:45
you've got to offer the best benefits. 100%. I mean, and that might be like, no shit, Ryan, like people listening, but when you're an entrepreneur, you're focused on a lot of things and you want to take care of people, you don't necessarily know all these things. I think that's why it's so important to have a great partner. And insurance is on the back burner, right? It's the last item that every business owner thinks about. Hey, I want to get my business model up and going. I want to get my revenue in. I want to set my policies and procedures. Oh, I have to.

07:14
do insurance. Oh my gosh, how do I do that? Right? Insurance is very confusing. There's a lot of steps that goes involved with running it. And to your point, though, I think COVID really kind of exposed to all of us as Americans, right? People that lost their jobs. Hey, now I'm not going to go to an employer if they're not offering insurance, right? That is a huge thing. It kind of goes in that mindset. Oh, I need I need I need as an employee. And I preach about right employees in today's market.

07:39
they are screaming prior to even getting hired saying, hey Ryan, if I could work for you, you better pay me the highest you could pay and you better give me the best benefits. Yeah. Right, so that's kind of the story there. And I think, you know, if employers are maybe naive and unaware.

07:57
of how important that is at the beginning. Yeah, I think they become aware of it pretty quickly once they're hiring the best talent and they have to go through that process. Right. I do think, you know, we all have insurance, even those that, you know, employed and everyone in the room has insurance. Right. I think we're naive to the ancillary things that can be added that are important. Right. Which go hand in hand with what we're talking about with the come to see help. Completely. And I think because I don't think I don't think the average Joe knows because

08:26
I think everybody complains and goes, my insurance doesn't cover enough. Exactly. I know that, but I didn't know that maybe these other things are out there. Right. So it becomes a win-win for the employer and employee, the education that happens with these programs. Completely, and right to your point, all of us have that.

08:43
major medical card in our wall that's just burning a hole, right? We pay this premium every month and hey, God forbid something happens, then I'll go go to fix one. Really, if you take a look at countries like Europe, Sweden, Italy, they have great health care systems because all their population are engaging in health at stage one.

09:01
rather than waiting till stage four, then I need that major medical card, right? So for example, like one of the elements in our program is employees will get access to a metabolic testing kit, right, so hey, prick your finger, send it back to your lab. It shows me, hey, maybe in my family, my males have heart issues. So maybe at a stage one, I could do something that'll prevent me from the time that I'm 60 and I have this huge claim, puts me in bankrupt, I'm owing the hospital a bunch of stuff, I'm owing my...

09:28
insurance carrier, a lot of money, having stuff on the pre-active approach is kind of the overall goal and mission of the program. Another big part of our program is we added behavioral health, right? This has been the

09:39
biggest hot topic in really the world post COVID, right? We've seen a giant increase in anxiety, depression, substance abuse. So we all know behavioral health counseling, it's expensive, right? It's typically not covered on your insurance policy, and you're paying out of pocket anywhere from, you know, 200 to 500 bucks per session. So it can get really, really costly when you have a serious, you know, issue that you need to talk to someone. And so through our program, we have 24 hour 365

10:07
therapists and counselors that employees and their families can access. So hey, if I'm we deal this a lot with like a hospital organization, so maybe on employee, my patient just passed away and I'm really depressed, really sad, I want to talk with therapists and call in. But maybe I'm just overall have anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and I want to talk to someone on a regular basis. They have behavioral health coaches that they can schedule unlimited amount of times, they don't pay any co pay. And it's a huge value for

10:31
employees and their families. Yeah, I mean that is big. But I'm gonna back up for one second because you hit a hot topic for me. I literally, one of our clients, one of my good friends and my doctor is Dr. Longevity, Longevity doctor. And I got on my soapbox, we did a show several weeks back talking about how backwards the healthcare system that we get, you know, we thank the doctor for curing things that should have been prevented already. Completely. That could have been prevented. 100%. Because we have these

11:01
We have medicine and technology and all this stuff at our fingertips. But we're just always treating versus preventing. And I know the doctors have always said, they might say it. They're good for you. But it's not. I mean, it goes to, you know, most people don't even go to internal medicine doctors. They don't even look at their blood every year. And what's even crazier, so to that point, as we all know, right, if you're... So there's this study that, let's say you're taking four prescriptions, another part of our program that we're adding.

11:30
some of those prescriptions are actually canceling out some of the other ones. So that's how these people get hooked on these prescriptions. Hey, I need these five pills. Hey, but really if you're taking prescription A with prescription C, that's canceling each other out. So you're really not even getting the benefit of that. So most of the time employees don't even need it and in that lifestyle change, right? Whether it be your diet, whether it be doing one of the aspects to engage in preventative care, that's where that stinking thinking in our country is really gonna start to change. And that's the overall goal.

11:59
of healthcare I think is the long term. And look, I'm kind of like the anti-Kumbaya guy. Like I'm just not, I'm kinda like toughen up, toughen up. But I'll say this, if you have healthy employees, it's good for business. Correct. Like, you know, like doing health and wellness, you know, all those things. And so, you know, you want your employees to be happy and healthy. Correct.

12:22
that's good for the bottom line, ultimately. Because if they're sick all the time, they're doing all the stuff that's treating instead of preventing. Correct. So it makes a lot of sense that these programs get enacted, but I just don't think the awareness is out there. You're absolutely correct. And for example, like...

12:38
Everyone's familiar with telemedicine, right? Hey, call in, I'll chat with the doctor. Everyone has telemedicine. Everyone pays a copay for that. So included in our program is no copay. But bigger point is we added virtual primary care. So not a lot of people know, but right now, about seven out of nine primary care visits can be handled telephonically. So, right, when I go to my primary care doctor, I think he likes me. I think he cares about me, but I see him for like 10 minutes, right? And he's like, oh, Tanner, you're fit, you're healthy. You're good, see you later, right? That really could have been done virtually. Why do I need to go into the office, call out of work,

13:08
Take my kids. I was money. Exactly. Yeah. So being able to provide that benefit, virtual primary care to employees and their entire families right now, I'm not calling out of work. Now I can do it from the confines of my home. Right at the end of the day, going to the hospital nowadays. That's where sick people go. Right. Especially post covid. I don't want to go to the hospital. I don't want to catch something and, you know, become even more sick than I already am. Yeah. What what was the foundation of this program? I know you talked about the one one twenty five. Yeah. Yeah. You know, like, but what?

13:36
What did all this come about? Yeah, so Section 125, all that Section 125 really does is allow a business owner to put in a pre-tax deduction for medical benefits, all right? Your 401K, HSA, major medical, et cetera.

13:49
This program specifically really sparks from the Affordable Care Act. So the Affordable Care Act, what Obama put in place back in 2011. Really, the whole idea behind the Affordable Care Act was to have employees engage in preventative care. That was kind of the goal and mission. Right. Hey, you get a annual physical for free and some other, you know, they should have called me Tanner. They needed a national television campaign. They did shit because nobody knows about it. They did a horrible job marketing it. Right. They did a horrible job. So back in 2015 is really what sparked this program in.

14:18
Particular because the Affordable Care Act had an amendment to it that said you can now bill insurance companies for a wellness activity So let's say I go to my doctor, right? And let's just say I'm doing my annual checkup. He says Tanner you're fit you're healthy, but you know, it's a Maybe it was in the fall. Are you gonna get your flu shot or what about I'm not old enough, but colonoscopies Maybe he talks to me about a different disease prevention benefit There's ultimately medical information all has CPT codes embedded within it Even if you're just educating you on a different topic that that doctor

14:46
is gonna go bill your insurance company accordingly for. So that's kind of what sparked the premise behind all this is to have really employees understand, hey, preventative care is good. And hey, there's additional resources for you to receive that same care now through this program. It's just that, getting that out to the market and having employees understand where can I receive this same care for a cheaper cost? I mean, is it possible?

15:11
You know, I'm a firm believer that things happen. I mean, within organizations, they're top down or bottom up. So. The employees just not know about this. Do they not ever like come and like ask for these type things? Does it ever come from the, you know, the groundswell up? Not typically, because right insurance is boring and especially group health insurance, it's never.

15:34
you never will see an ad on social media. You'll never see it on your TV. Everything you do, all insurance related stuff, is all about drugs. We all seen the latest drugs. Oh, if you maybe consult to your doctor two weeks before and talk to a professional about our drug. Every commercial now is pretty much a drug. Some type of pharmacy that can change your life in a split of a second. So, employees just aren't, they aren't educated, frankly, on what they want. They're just...

16:02
really being told, hey, you want this, and this is what you're gonna pay, and this is how it's been for the last 60 years. Yeah. So, let's give our audience a little bit of perspective about innovative health insurance advisors. I mean, I wanna really set the table, and for you, like, I mean, anyone listening's going, this is a really impressive guy. Yeah. Like, I'm just saying, man, I mean, you know your shit.

16:27
And but I think it's important to know like your background, the background of the business. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, like, let's talk about that. Yeah, I'll tell you kind of how I how I came to be. Yeah.

16:37
Born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada. So Vegas is a very, very small town. So I'm sure anyone that's watching this, if you're from Vegas, you probably know me or my family or one of my friends or cousins, et cetera. What happens in Vegas, I can always stay in Vegas, right? That is for sure. You did leave, right? I did leave. So yeah, my mom is, she's been in Vegas since the seventies. She was basically practically born there. Growing up, had a great time. I went to Faith Lutheran High School as one of the big kind of football schools, kind of rival to Bishop Gorman.

17:04
And then Vegas is very interesting because if you're Vegas, like I said, it's very it's that small town feel. So if you stay in Vegas, it's kind of seen like, oh, you're staying in Vegas. Really? Like, what are you going to what are you going to do? And so you got to get out of Vegas to make something. Got to get out. Yeah. So I was a I was a big advocate for leaving your hometown. And so that's what my parents they they had no option. Hey, you're we'll pay for college, but you're not going to, you know, you're not going to, you know, are you're getting out of this state?

17:31
So kudos to them. I've had an amazing upbringing. And so kind of behind all this, so my father's the president and CEO of our company. So I always kind of tell people, insurance is kind of in my blood. My dad is the hardest worker I know. He's an amazing guy, great role model, really set the foundation for me and my siblings on what it looks like to work ethically, and work hard and doing it in the right way. And so I went to Arizona State, and then I actually did door to door

18:01
I sold door-to-door pest control back in 2017, 2018, and the summer of 2019. So I started that in Sacramento. If you could do door-to-door sales, man, you could do anything. And I completely, I'm a huge advocate for door-to-door. It sucked and I loved being in that suck, right? I learned so much from knocking on those doors, talking to 200 people and saying, hey, go kick rocks, sorry, get off my porch, right? And being able to then learn, okay.

18:28
how am I not selling anyone? Why people tell me to kick rocks? And I look at these other guys, these leaders, my mentors, and I was like, okay, I'm just gonna copy exactly what they're doing, and really just built that skill, and then I was able to have someone's credit card that I just met within five minutes. So that, having that power.

18:45
Really was like, man, I was at a Vegas trick or like, yeah. I said, hey, if you play a little blackjack right now, I'll give you a little bit more. Yeah. You intern on David Copperfield said that. Yeah, 100 percent. Yeah. So you had to be so door to door, man. You might as well have been doing magic. Yeah, 100 percent. That is that is tough. Yeah, it was it was tough. So I did that. Didn't really do super well my first year. And then I recruited the team kind of taught them how to sell my second year. Sold out in Austin, Texas.

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Yeah, it

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wanting to go into, you know, the family business of insurance, because I know insurance is, it's so I love it, because there's so many nuances to learn with insurance. And so I really dove into it. Fall of 2019, I kind of started working with my dad and our business partners and kind of learning, okay, what do we do? What is this ACA compliance? We had kind of a San Francisco specific product. And then come spring 2020, COVID it, right. So everything obviously went to a pause. Ironically, I was actually in Mexico, the day that MBA shut down. And so

20:12
My mom, my mom's full Italian, so she's very protective of her kids, of her cubs. She calls me, she's like, they're going to shut the borders. You need to get to America right now. And so we were down in Rocky Point. It's about about three hours, four hours south of Phoenix. And me and my buddy drove home and made it back. And then we were all kind of in this waiting period for those first two weeks of, you know, government shutting down. What is this? What's going on? Right. We've never seen anything in our culture like this. So then.

20:39
Just from our relationships in the insurance world, we actually got into the PPE industry. That industry was a complete sham. There was a lot of fluff in that industry to say that these lot of people saying, hey, I could sell you these masks, I could sell you these gloves. So that was a whole, whole another rabbit hole. And then once that kind of died down summer of 2020, I just really dove into insurance. And insurance is all about relationships. So mainly what I do is, you know, build relationships with the brokerages. So your Aon, your USI hubs, Galgers, and

21:08
This goes back to insurance, right? You could have the coolest, shiniest product on the street with insurance, but if you don't have that relationship, you're not gonna get the ear of the business owner. So, right, it's more of, hey, you're a broker, you like me, I like you, I have a cool product, I think this could be a fit for your book of business. Let's write a couple groups. So that's kinda what sparked it, and then, kinda been, you know, not looking back since then. I love it.

21:30
That's good, man. I think it's good perspective. And, you know, I like the story of, I mean, not just the door to our sales, but like, you know, you can go straight into probably the company business, but, you know, earned your keep. Got out there. Cut your teeth and kudos to my dad. Right. I mean, I'm I work very hard and I my dad's the hardest on me. And then as he should be, my dad was, I mean, from Nebraska, he played football at college, he coached football, you know, he was my football coach, you know, grown up my entire life.

21:55
And I wanted my dad to be hard on me, right? He would yell at me. He would throw footballs on my head during practice. He would, I have some crazy stories on that, but I think from the perspective of my father, right, he never wants to have my perception of, Oh, my son's only successful because of his name. Right. So he really gave me nothing. I started really from the ground. He just kind of gave me the base work of how it's modeled and, um, kudos to him and I very appreciative of how that's modeled. It's gotta be, uh, rewarding though. You know, it's.

22:25
When you know that you're helping people, like with, you know, with encompassing health, which we'll get back into, like these programs that don't have the wares that they should, they have clear win, win, win, win situations. That's gotta be rewarding, I would think. 100%, yeah, because it's a value to employees, right? And I just always go back to, if I take a look at, you know, employees in your regular employee, right? Faking 15, 20 bucks an hour, right? They need care. I mean, I had a...

22:54
company down in California, they are a big construction company. They do like drywall staffing, etc. And most of their employees, right, I'm sure you can imagine 99% Hispanic male, most of their employees aren't on their corporate benefits. Most of these employees have zero coverage. Right. So why do you think those cultures don't go to the hospital because they aren't right? They're not it's not affordable. It's it's it's out of the picture for them.

23:17
So being able to provide value in that scenario of, hey, you can go see your primary care, you can get access to behavioral health. My favorite part of this program, we added in this RX plan. It basically has 2,900 prescriptions at a zero dollar copay. So you're thinking about, hey, my kid has an ear infection, right? I need to get a Moxisilin prescribed to my CVS. I pay a 10 to a $50 copay typically to get that same prescription. Now through our program, it's just going through a different mode of filling that same prescription. It's the same bottle. You get it at your same pharmacy.

23:47
You just now pay zero. Wow. It's huge. Twenty nine hundred. Twenty nine hundred. So it's all your generic prescriptions. So anything that would be typically covered, I think it's about 80 of the prescriptions that would be covered under a primary care visit. And that's all under encompassing health. Correct. Wow. And so for that coverage applies to whether they have a base plan or not. Correct. Yeah. Regardless of what they have going on, think of the encompassing health program as sort of like an afflac policy. Right. Everyone knows afflac and afflac, right? You can go out and.

24:14
bolt on a hospital indemnity plan, you can get a critical illness, you can get a cancer policy. So whatever that Affleck plan just kind of bolts on to whatever you have going on for your traditional insurance. So all their traditional insurance, major medical stays in play. This is just kind of a supplemental bolt on enhancement. Yep. I mean, I guess we're saving the best for last.

24:33
Revenue. Yeah, I mean this is where it gets sweet for the employer. Yeah Specifically and and the employee. Yeah, because that's what that's what blows my mind on this Like you get all these benefits you get all the prescriptions right you get all the preventative Yeah, and then there's a revenue component 100% let's say so on the so to begin with the first kind of revenue aspect

24:55
It's the prescriptions, right? So on any this is why when I'm talking with these employers, ask you, OK, right now, are you self-funded? Meaning, are you really the one that's paying for all these insurance claims? Are you fully insured with your Buka plan, Kaiser, etc.? Regardless of what they say, the biggest cost of claim on any insurance claim pool are prescriptions. Right. So if you think about it, the more prescriptions, utilization you have on said claim pool, higher risk and utilization renewal rates go on that, you know, fully insured.

25:23
Now through this program, I say, OK, Mr. employer, right now you can get that employee can get that same bottle, same pill, same prescription, same pharmacy, employee pay zero bigger picture really for you. Those claims are shifted right there now not comes off of the comes off of it. And I tell them the more elements we could have shifted off that self insured or fully insured from the prescriptions is the biggest part. But hey, if I have Blue Cross Telemedicine paying a fifty dollar copay, I can get the same telemedicine. I pay zero. Why wouldn't I use that? And now shifted off the claim.

25:53
So that's a huge part. But then as far as the revenue aspect goes, so how this program functions, it functions based off a Section 125. So maybe I'll start on the employee side. So the employees, by being on this program, could potentially see an increase in their take home pay. And the reason behind that is because they see two new line items is basically how they works. First is a pre tax premium. So just like any other since 1978, all that does is reduce the taxable income of the employee. What's different, though, is

26:23
What sparked with this program, that's why I mentioned back in 15, how the Affordable Care Act had that amendment to it. Now the employees will get access to a claim payment, basically an indemnity claim payment for being engaged in medical care benefits. So employees need to engage in one aspect of the program per month to get this claim payment. And the result of having those two events results in a net increase in pay for the employee. That indemnity claim payment, it could be taxable to the employee, just like if I had an Affleck policy, right? And Affleck pays me.

26:50
say 20 grand if I have a cancer plan. However, I'm claiming that as miscellaneous income is kind of the same way with with all these kind of insurance indemnity programs. And then really just the the byproduct for the employer. It truly functions just like any other Section 125 since 1978 by having this pre-tax that reduces the taxable income of the employee. That's how we reduce the FICA spend for the employer and they can potentially save about $700 per employee per year. Wow.

27:18
I mean, and I mean, we can do the math that adds up. Yeah. I mean, hell, I mean, whether you got 30 employees or 300, it's still, same story. Still a lot of math. I know if you got a thousand plus employees, this starts to really make sense, right? 100%. Or it's like a no brainer. Right. And that's where, I mean, I always like, I'm always skeptical. Right.

27:39
You know, like, and my listeners wouldn't appreciate it if I didn't try to poke holes. But that's the thing, like, we've been at this and I'm familiar with the program. And I mean, every time it blows my mind how the winds stack up. And kind of to just go on the background of that. So back in, as a TPA, let me frame it like this. So.

28:00
As a TPA, we get approached all the time, right? People come to us as a vendor, hey, I got a new insurance product. I know you guys, Innovative Health, you guys have a big book, you partner with all these brokerages. Open up your distribution. I got a cool shiny product, can you let me in? And so back in 2016, 2017, we actually got approached by a couple different vendors in this market. At that time, we just didn't feel comfortable enough to release a product because we didn't think the compliance was there. And right, this goes back to all we have at the end of the day is our name, right? We have a good name in the insurance market.

28:30
products along compliance. And so that's why it took us a decent long time, honestly, to create this product because the IRS set guidelines for what they want to see with these types of programs. So we really basically built our program along the compliance guidelines that the IRS has. And that's kind of where we're at today. Tanner, that's what I'm saying. Win, win, win, win. So we know people are listening. They're going, wait a second. Like.

28:57
Number one, they're like running to show notes going, or their broker going, how do I get this? But let's talk through, I love giving people tangible value of, okay, what's this look like? I got 250 employees, I've checked all the boxes, I've agreed to things, and you're onboarding me.

29:20
What do we have to do? What are the hoops or, you know, how easy or difficult is this? What's the day in the life of this process? Yeah, so what's really nice about this program is that it's very different than your typical insurance and the fact that this program really is just, it's sort of a payroll functionality. So all the data feed is really funneled through payroll.

29:40
So it's really, I'll explain that. But basically, we hop on the phone with a business owner, say, hey, business owner, this is how the program works. This is really in layman's terms, how it functions. By the end of it, every business owner sort of wants to see their analysis of what they could potentially be saving and what potentially their employees, you know, get from this program. So we kind of run a preliminary census. It's these kind of seven fields. I love the calculator, man. I'm just going to tell you, you plug it in. I know it's an estimate, but still. It's a cool thing. Because right as a business owner, you can see, okay.

30:10
this is where the rubber meets the road, right? Ultimately, is the juice worth the squeeze for me? So once we get that yes for the employer, we take a big approach to education and really all the heavy lifting that goes involved with running this program. So prior to us even going live, we take typically three to six weeks before we go live to do this pre-educational period. During this time, we'll basically set up two different silos of education that are kind of running together. The first is really just making the automations within their payroll. So

30:38
whether that be API, input files, payroll codes, deduction codes, et cetera. And that work is not upon the employer. It's really, hey, I work with Paycore, right? I'm gonna connect my Paycore rep with my team and off they go from there. That tech talk tech. I'm not a tech guy so I don't know anything about that. Second side, I think is the most vital aspect of the program is that we actually educate all their employees.

31:00
So as you can imagine, right, this goes back to everything that we've been talking about, employees don't know what they have access to, they barely even understand. If you think about it in the traditional sense, okay, I have a major medical, I have an open enrollment every year, two weeks, I gotta be this insurance professional within these two weeks. And I think I picked the best plan for me, but I don't really know, right, I have no clue and maybe I don't use all the stuff that's offered to me in that corporate plan. So during this time, we'll educate all their employees.

31:26
So, hey, your paycheck's gonna look a little bit differently. You're gonna see these two new line items, educate them on the tax side of things. Once that's done, really we're educating them on the benefits. Hey, you now get access to virtual primary care for you and your entire family. You get access to behavioral health, virtual dermatology, Rx programs. So we show them how to utilize the benefits and that's really what takes the bulk of that three to six week time period, just because, right, employees will have questions. Maybe they don't understand it. We gotta re-educate them, host webinars, phone calls, emails, text messages.

31:55
And that's kind of what creates that three to five weeks. And then after that, and it's really a program goes live and off they go. But to the employee, no added cost and potential up to three or 4% raise. They just got a bump. Yeah, the biggest misconception we get, right? When I say, oh, there's no out of pocket cost, everyone will think it's free, right? By all means, nothing in our world is ever free, right? There is 1000% of costs associated with it. There's a cost of the insurance and there's an admin fee. Both of those costs are just generated from the tax savings.

32:25
So that's how it's at a no out of pocket cost per se. But the net net is still additional savings for the employer and all these benefits for the employee. Correct. And potentially increase in paycheck. Correct. Yeah, it's still like, you know. It's crazy to think that something like that's out there. It's out there and it's so few people aware of it, take advantage of it. And that you guys have streamlined it as reputable as you are.

32:53
streamlining it into a program that takes all the guesswork out of it. 100%. I love it. So if people are interested and they're trying to weigh, is there any potential roadblock? Like, is there certain companies that don't qualify? Is there any is there any potential things that people need to think about from that side of it?

33:17
There's nothing really from an employer's side that would disqualify them per se. Each client is different, right? So your potential saving could differ on your employee population, how much they're waging, their, you know, merit status, their exemptions claim. But really every industry it works because there's no really guidelines. The only specific so on FICA, there's a max FICA limit. So for anything, you could have savings in FICA up to the point you make one hundred and sixty three thousand. So that once an employee reaches that mark.

33:44
there's no savings to be had. So it's really not generated at that point. But if you're an employee making 17,000 to 163 or over that, then it's kind of a home run success. And so at worst, the savings might not be as high depending on the employee, the employer. So you're saying, but the out of pocket cost still remains zero. Correct. And the benefits are still outrageous. Correct. Yeah, yeah.

34:11
I'm out of holes to poke. When you start to weigh your options, you're like, man, right, that it just kind of checks every box, right, especially from just a benefits perspective, right. I always go back to right, the cost of insurance is so great, right. These employees are truly spending so much money. They're going into debt.

34:27
really when they're going to the hospital. So being able to receive this care, having those claims shifted, I mean, it's a great story for both parts. Is there a time, you know, for a company where something like a decision like this makes sense or can it be implemented anytime? Yeah, any point. I like to do it outside of open enrollment. And the reason for that, right, open enrollment, I don't wanna muddy the water, right? It's confusing, it's stressful, it's very busy during those two weeks. So I like to do it outside of traditional open enrollment, really.

34:56
You know, we could start it at any point though. Yeah. Win, win, win. Yeah. So I know we're going to have links, but essentially they sign up. Yeah. They get more information. They get on a call. Exactly. With you or someone else. Yep. At the company. Learn more, and we start rocking and rolling. You got it. Easy enough. Hey, guys, you got to take advantage of this. And look, we're going to have the links on my site, rayandoffer.com, as well as on my social media channels for how you can get involved.

35:22
Tanner man. It's been great. It's been fun. Thanks for having me. Hey, great. Attention, revenue and recruitment. Yes. All in one encompassing health, the three Rs and it's radical as hell. We appreciate you coming on. Thanks, brother. Hey guys, you know, to find us the radcast.com find all the highlight clips from today, all of the show notes where you get involved.

35:46
You know where I'm at. I'm at Ryan Alford on all the platforms. I'm blowing up on TikTok. So get me over there. I'll see you next time. Radcast.