Aon plc (NYSE: AON), a leading global professional services firm providing a broad range of risk, retirement and health solutions, has announced that it has worked with Invesco, the global investment management firm, to harmonise benefits for 1,800 Invesco employees in 16 European, Middle East and African (EMEA) countries using a single technology platform. Aon’s technology enabled the programme, which not only follows each country’s specific regulations, but also allows employees to see and transact with a single Invesco-branded website. Invesco can save time and understand costs through clear reporting, driving better insights for the business and employees.
Tony Ark, Head of Benefits, EMEA at Invesco, explained:
“It was very important to ensure that our new portal was aligned to Invesco’s benefits philosophy and purpose. These aim to help employees and their eligible family members get more out of life. We want to encourage employees to be actively involved in their ongoing health, wellbeing and retirement plans, so our new portal enables employees to achieve this through a simple, intuitive and personalised online tool, which hosts all benefits in one place.
“The portal essentially plays a dual role, with an online library of information unique to each country’s benefits, plus a transactional capability allowing employees to make benefit selections as often as necessary. This happens securely in a few clicks, and also provides an immediate confirmation to the employee with details of when it will be processed through payroll.”
The implementation began in May 2019 and the programme timeline was assessed on complexity and headcount. Aon and Invesco collaboratively worked with each country’s benefit providers and managed regulatory complexities. Now, all employees across the region have access to a secure Invesco Benefits Portal, offering resources for viewing, changing and accessing their individual benefits plan information. It is accessible from any internet-ready device at any time.
This project was a cultural shift, as not only had Invesco historically used a paper-based system with fewer efficiencies, it had a less user-friendly experience for employees. Now, employees are encouraged to take action to support their own needs supported with relevant prompts and reminders, which is more in line with Invesco’s inclusive culture. Invesco employees also have access to a dedicated help desk, managed by Aon, which operates in seven languages. The portal is Invesco branded, which was essential to help employees gain trust in the system.
For Invesco’s business, an efficient online audit trail removes delays and issues which tend to be problematic with a paper-based system. Prior to the benefits portal, Invesco managed the processes with nearly 30 spreadsheets, which meant reporting, managing or acting on change was slow and cumbersome.
Alistair Fox, Client Director, Online Benefits at Aon, said:
“In some countries, benefits and technology don’t go hand in hand. A multitude of pension schemes, medical processes or legislative rules can create enormous complexities when harmonising benefits for a single employer, yet on top of this some suppliers didn’t use online technology before. We’ve worked together to bring all participating vendors online, supporting their adoption of new methods. As much as the system has been a great success for engaging employees, the functionality of the process has improved dramatically too. We collate all employee benefit decisions to report to Invesco’s payroll and HR as well as benefits vendors. Everything is tracked and monitored for informing strategic improvements and reporting through governance meetings.”
Tony Ark added:
“By using the new benefits platform, we’ve already seen major advances in efficiency and accuracy. Across EMEA, employee engagement levels have significantly increased with over 90% of employees in each country engaging with the platform on a regular basis.
“As a business, we now have access to extensive operational dashboards for each country providing critical management information to help us understand exactly what’s working or not in each country. This also provides annual spend data to help drive our benefits strategy, so we can measure which benefits are popular or under-utilised and determine where to make strategic decisions that will better support both employees and the business.”
