Employee benefit

Employee benefits (also called group benefits, perquisites, or perks) include various types of non-wage compensation provided to employees in addition to their normal wages or salaries. Most kinds of employee benefits are taxable to at least some degree.

Coverage types
Employee benefits usually refer to employer sponsored life insurance, disability insurance, extended health insurance, and dental insurance plans. Such group insurance plans are a top-up to existing provincial coverage. An employer provided group insurance plan is coordinated with the provincial plan in the respective province or territory, therefore an employee covered by such a plan must be covered by the provincial plan first.

The life, accidental death and dismemberment and disability insurance component is an employee benefit only. Some plans provide a minimal dependent life insurance benefit as well.

The health care plan may include any of the following: hospital room upgrades (Semi-Private or Private), medical services/supplies and equipment, travel medical (60 or 90 days per trip), registered therapists and practitioners (ie. physiotherapists, acupuncturists, chiropractors, etc), prescription requiring drugs, vision (eye exams, contacts/lenses), and Employee Assistance Programs.

The dental plan usually includes Basic Dental (cleanings, fillings, root canals), Major Dental (crowns, bridges, dentures) and/or Orthodontics (braces).

Other than the employer sponsored health benefits described above, the next most common employee benefits are group savings plans, Group Registered Retirement Savings Plans (RRSPs) and Group Profit Sharing Plans, which have tax and growth advantages to individual saving plans.

Term life insurance: group versus individual
If group life insurance is offerred by your employer, but optional (and paid by you), compare the group plan with an individual quote from a life agent/broker (or shop online on a comparator site). If you are young and healthy, getting individual term insurance from a major lifeco may be a better deal financially since you are not paying for old, sick, smoking males as you would with group insurance. With an individual policy, if you leave your job, you won't loose coverage. Also you get the face amount of insurance you need, not some arbitrary multiple of your annual salary. On the other hand, group life insurance can be advantageous for older workers, or those in bad health, since all members of the group pay the same premiums, and no medical exams are required.

Enrollment
Most employee benefit plans have an annual enrollment period for the following year and offer flexible benefits that can be to tailored to meet their employees’ unique personal needs.

Administration
Most employee benefits plans are administered externally, generally using one of the major Canadian insurance companies such as Great-West, Manulife, Sun-Life.