New tool helps brokers organize book of business

BenefitMall is hoping to make business management a little bit easier for brokers.

The online benefits and HR services company has rolled out a new tool for its more than 20,000 adviser clients, called Agency Workspace, which aims to help brokers better organize their book of business. The online tool is meant to centralize the client consultation and purchasing process, the benefits provider says.

“Agency Workspace is a home base for BenefitMall’s technology for brokers to support their clients,” says Laura Clenney, vice president of marketing services at BenefitMall.

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The new tool can help brokers with starting or reviewing quotes, setting up enrollments and viewing commissions. The system automatically imports brokers quote and census data for benefits enrollment. It also has a feature that allows brokers to live chat, email or phone BenefitMall’s new digital support team, which is available to assist with product, service and training inquiries. Agency Workspace is available to all advisers using BenefitMall at no additional cost, Clenney says.

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Agencies that have multiple agents and administrative assistants can use the system to better organize their team. Clenney says that companies can use the tool to “share and provide access customized to your business model.”

See also: Zywave’s system aims to automate commission tracking

BenefitMall has made other recent updates to its offerings. In March, the company integrated Ease, an online benefits enrollment platform, with its PayFocus Pro, a benefits administration feature that allows clients to share employee demographics and recurring deductions with their payroll system. The company also introduced TalentFocus, a new payroll feature providing talent recruitment and electronic onboarding.

Brokers are looking for additional ways to streamline benefits selling, and tech companies have taken notice. For example, insurance tech provider Zywave in March updated its agency management system, called BrokerageBuilder, to simplify the commission tracking process. Eric Rentsch, head of product management for Zywave, says the update is in anticipation of a larger product rollout later this year. The goal, he told Employee Benefit Adviser, is to automate commission tracking for brokers.

“I think it’s really about automating these predictable workflows so they can spend more time on the client facing and strategic work that they need to do,” he says.