As you review insurance plans for your medical practice staff, you may want to consider offering long-term disability insurance.
This type of coverage can be a valuable benefit for a medical practice to offer. Statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau suggest that one in five employees have a chance of becoming disabled during their careers. On average, long-term disability absences from work last for more than two years.
Long-term disability insurance covers a portion of an absent employee’s compensation, typically up to 60 percent. And plans may be more flexible and affordable than many employers expect them to be.
Here you’ll find five standout advantages for adding group long-term disability insurance to your practice’s coverage plan.
Attract High-Quality Employees
One of the best things you can do to ensure the success of your practice is to staff it with top-notch employees, and a good benefits package can help you to fill those spots with high-quality personnel.
Almost 9 out of 10 employees would pay for disability insurance if their employers contributed half of the cost. With this kind of enthusiasm about the product, offering long-term disability insurance can certainly help you lead the pack in the race to hire the best employees.
Why are job seekers so keen on long-term disability insurance? It boils down to security. While a competitive salary is always a good start, the peace of mind that comes with knowing such a salary can be protected in the event of illness or injury acts as a major incentive.
Affordable Rates, Easy Process
Small physician practices are likely to overestimate the cost of group long-term disability insurance and underestimate its advantages. By spreading the risk across the entire group of insured employees, coverage can cost as little as $20 per month for non-physician staff members.
Persistent health conditions can be unpleasant, but submitting long-term disability claims is painless. Factors like age, gender, tobacco use and occupation are considered when calculating costs, and for an additional fee employees can often obtain greater coverage.
Accelerate the Road to Recovery
When a medical condition forces someone who works at a health care practice into an extended leave of absence, both business and employee have an interest in a speedy recovery. Long-term disability plans lessen the financial burdens on sick or injured employees, allowing them to more easily pay increasing health care costs, which can shorten recovery time, and hopefully lead to a quicker return to work.
Ensure Your Revenue
When a favorite physician goes out on disability, current patients can be lost, and new ones become that much more difficult to bring through the door. Key person disability plans, which provide a benefit to businesses suffering from the absence of an essential employee, can help to manage situations such as this one alongside long-term disability insurance.
Protect Your Return on Investment
If you sat down and calculated how much you’ve sunk into your career and medical practice (which you probably have done -- many times), you’d likely see figures totaling in the hundreds of thousands. Money well spent, no doubt, but only if you can guarantee seeing those figures again one day on the other side of the balance sheet.
Long-term disability insurance protects your investments, income and lifestyle. Enrolling in a group plan for your practice is a decision only you can make, but by no means is it a tough one.
