In the fast-paced world of small businesses, every decision has significant consequences. Employee health insurance is a critical factor that owners of small businesses must take into account to achieve a better workforce. Although the early expenses may be a deterrent, the advantages of providing health insurance greatly surpass the first outlay.
If you are a small business owner, read this article to explore the numerous advantages of health insurance and how it protects the well-being of both your staff and the firm itself.
The Need for Health Insurance for Small Business Owners
Before starting with all the advantages of buying a health plan, you must understand the basic fundamentals of it for a small business owner. A comprehensive health insurance policy offers financial security to the policyholder for a specific period.
Group health insurance plans are ideal for such business owners to provide quality healthcare to their employees. Below are some advantages of choosing health insurance as a small business owner.
1.    Increase Employee Retention
As a small business owner, including a comprehensive health insurance plan within your company’s employment package is beneficial for both your business and your employee. This approach portrays that you care about your employee’s overall well-being which plays a role in increasing the percentage of employee retention. It also attracts more new talented and skilful individuals to join your company.
2.    Enhances Employee Productivity
Most business owners do not understand that providing a health plan to their employees will enhance work productivity and efficiency. A comprehensive health insurance policy provides optimal healthcare coverage to your employees which will make them stress-free from any financial burden in times of medical emergencies.
3.    Scaling Small Businesses
People strategy or creating a positive organisational culture is quite essential for scaling your small business. Your employees are just like your extended family and making them satisfied is your responsibility.
Providing a health plan in an employee’s overall package will enhance employee satisfaction level. Offering such benefits to your employees helps small businesses scale their operations more effectively and achieve long-term growth and success.
4.    Tax Benefits for Businesses
As a small business owner, you can get significant tax advantages by availing group or corporate health insurance plans for your employees. As per Section 80D Deduction of the Income Tax Act of India, a policyholder can enjoy tax relaxation of up to Rs. 25,000 on the premium they paid towards their health insurance plan. This tax benefit can reduce major portions of your company’s tax liability.
Types of Health Insurance Plans Ideal for Small Business Owners
Below are some common types of health insurance plans that a small business owner can choose to avail for their company’s employees.
- Group Health Insurance Plan: Unlike Individual health insurance plans, group health insurance plans provide medical coverage for a group of employees. Choosing this type of plan is ideal for a small organisation as it is much more cost-effective than individual health plans.
- Family Floater Health Insurance Plan: Another ideal type of health plan for small businesses is a family floater health policy. Under this plan, the insurer offers medical coverage for the entire family of the insured person.
- Top-up Health Insurance Plan: You can also avail of top-up health plans that offer additional medical coverage to enhance employee satisfaction. This type acts as an added financial security layer for your employees.
Things to Look into While Choosing the Best Health Insurance for Your Business
As a business owner, you must consider a few essential factors before buying health plans. Remember, choosing the wrong health plan would not enhance employee satisfaction despite spending lump sum money towards their health. That is why go through the following essential factors before buying one for your small business.
- Assessing the medical requirements of your employees is important to choosing the best-fitted insurance plan for them. While assessing, consider things, like their age, medical history, job-related potential risks, etc.
- You must look at the list of network hospitals to ensure that the insurer offers a wide array of network hospitals. Note that during times of emergencies, proximity to network hospitals plays a crucial role.
- Go through the inclusions and exclusions of a health plan to ensure comprehensive healthcare coverage for your valued employees. Besides, you must minutely read and comprehend all the terms and conditions of the plans.
- There are varied insurance companies thus conduct thorough research and choose the most preferable insurer. For instance, ACKO health plans are ideal for small businesses as they allow the insured person to manage and file claims through ACKO’s online application.
- Do not forget to check out the add-on covers like maternity coverage, critical illness coverage, OPD expenses, etc. You must evaluate all the add-on covers to choose the best-suited health plan for your business.
- Note that a complex claiming process will create a tense situation for employees which will eventually hamper their mental well-being. Insurers like ACKO allow their policyholders to easily file claims with a few clicks from their mobile application.
The Bottom Line
Health insurance may appear expensive at first, but in the long run, the advantages greatly exceed the expense. Offering health insurance puts your company and its employees in a win-win position. There will be a boost in morale, productivity, and loyalty as your staff feels safe and respected. A healthier staff, lower attrition, and a better public perception will all be advantageous to your business.
Now that you know all the benefits of including health insurance in your employee package, do the needful. In addition, ACKO offers attractive and comprehensive health plans at competitive price brackets which make this insurer perfect for small business owners. So, contact them today to know more!
