A staffing agency’s primary focus is to find and secure the best candidates for client companies, but that can’t happen effectively if they themselves aren’t hiring the best staffing talent. How do recruiting firms separate themselves from the competition when it comes to hiring and retaining talent?
One outside-the-box strategy would be to offer a disability insurance benefit to employees. This isn’t a generic employee benefit that most companies should have, like health insurance, vision insurance or a 401(k). This benefit is a differentiator. It will make your staffing firm a unique and attractive employment destination for recruiting talent.
What Is Disability Insurance?
Disability insurance is income protection. If a policyholder suffers from a qualifying physical injury, medical illness or mental health issue that impacts their ability to work and earn a living, disability insurance will replace a portion of their regular income while they are out of work.
For reference, disability insurance often replaces between 40% and 60% of a policyholder’s regular income. That can be a huge difference for most people if they’re without a paycheck for an extended period of time.
When it comes to the average disability insurance cost, Breeze recently published a report that analyzed all of our long term disability insurance quotes over the previous two years. In 2021, the average annual quoted premium for long term disability insurance was $1,297, or $108.11 monthly. It’s worth noting that this premium cost was also associated with the average monthly benefit amount being $3,151 in 2021. It’s also important to note that this was the average cost for individual disability insurance, not group disability insurance.
PREMIUM CONTENT: US Staffing Industry Forecast: May 2022 Update
Disability Insurance as an Employee Benefit
Disability insurance that’s offered as an employee benefit is known as group disability insurance. With group disability insurance, members of a company are all offered the opportunity to receive disability insurance coverage under the plan.
The benefits and costs for this type of income protection are usually the same for all members of the plan regardless of individual factors. Moreover, many employers will pick up the full premium cost so it can become very affordable for employees.
Because a group disability insurance employee benefit is not all too common, it could really set your staffing firm apart from the competition.
Why Disability Insurance?
Staffing firms should offer disability insurance as an employee benefit because of its value and because it would make them a unique employment destination.
The fact of the matter is that most people have very little, if any, money saved in the bank and are unfortunately very unprepared if injury or illness keeps them out of work and without an income. The Federal Reserve found 30% of consumers couldn’t cover an emergency $300 expense with cash savings. Another study found 48% of home foreclosures are due to disability. By offering your employees disability insurance, you are providing a possible financial safety net for them to continue paying their bills if they are forced to miss work.
A group disability insurance plan for your employees could separate your staffing firm from the competition and make it more attractive to the best talent the recruiting world has to offer.