In the present competitive marketplace, most businesses wish they could provide current and potential employees with comprehensive dental care benefits. “Dental plans rank as the third most important employee benefit, just behind health and retirement.”18 Based on Cathy Smithwick, dental practice leader at Mercer Consulting, dental coverage is the “visible benefit because on average 75% of employees will make use of a good dental plan.”19
Dental benefits not only increase employee satisfaction and morale, but they could also cut down the hours lost due to dental issues. Based on Oral Health in America, “employed adults lost a lot more than 164 million hours of work annually due to dental disease or dental visits.”10
A recent study from NADP implies that only 56% of the U.S. population has dental insurance.11 Therefore, inexpensive dental care solutions are highly coveted by both employers and employees. “To satisfy employee demand, more employers added dental to the huge benefits menu in recent years. One of the final holdouts, the us government, will offer dental benefits to employees in 2006.”20
“Seven out of ten employers (71%) offer dental benefits, often using them since the differentiating element in recruiting and retaining employees.”18 The investigation implies that the more expensive a business is, the more likely they are to supply dental benefits. “Among firms with at the least 10 employees, 56% offered dental coverage in 2003. Just one year later, that figure leaped to 67%, according to an annual survey of employer-sponsored health plans by Mercer Human Resource Consulting. Dental offerings among large employers (500 employers and up) jumped from 90% to 96% of firms.”20
Unfortunately, many businesses cannot afford to pay all or part of their employees’dental benefits. “Mercer data show dental costs averaged $577 for all employers in employers in 2003 and edged around $598 in 2004, a 3.6% increase. Large employers, meanwhile, saw a 5.4% increase from $574 to $605.”20 Based on Evelyn Ireland, Executive Director of NADP, 牙周病治療價錢 “employers aren’t dropping dental coverage, but they’re squeezing the amount of money they’re adding to it.”20 So as the cost of providing dental benefits to their employees continues to increase, businesses are passing these price hikes to employees. “The most obvious means for employers to control dental costs … is to produce employees pay more.”20
Kirk Rothrock, CEO of CompBenefits, believes that lots of businesses are shifting the cost of dental benefits to their employees.20 “The greatest trend we’ve seen throughout the last 3 or 4 years is the move from employer-paid benefits to voluntary benefits,” he says. “Employers say, ‘I can’t afford to pay your dental benefits.’ ”20 The State of the Dental Benefits Market, 2005 confirms that “over 70% of the populace is paying at the least a portion of these dental premiums” and about 25% are investing in their entire dental premium.16
Many businesses are looking at discount dental plans, a reasonable option to dental insurance, to defray the costs of providing their employees with valuable dental benefits. Discount dental plans present flexible, affordable dental benefits that are simple to implement and practically effortless to manage. They offer businesses with an ideal way complement their existing benefits and give you a more balanced benefits package. Many businesses are employing discount dental plans to supply dental benefits to individuals that are rarely included in traditional dental insurance, including retirees, part-timers, seasonal workers and uninsured dependants.
Discount dental plans are much more affordable compared to the $600 many companies are currently paying to cover employees with traditional dental insurance. Furthermore, discount dental plans save businesses valuable company time with convenient dental benefit solutions free of tedious paperwork hassles. Giving employees the freedom to select their own plan, businesses are relieved from the burden of picking dental benefits to fit the initial, individual needs of these diverse workforce. Discount dental plans allow businesses to award their employees with the peace of mind they deserve and the affordable dental care they desire.