In this installment of Kashable Conversations, we had the pleasure of speaking with Nicole Mebane, Benefits Manager at Community Medical Centers (CMC), a private, non-profit healthcare network in Fresno, California, about their approach to employee benefits, why the hospital system focuses on employee financial wellness, and how Kashable has helped their employees.
Click the link below to listen to the full conversation, or keep reading for highlights!
Listen to the full conversation here
Could you give a little background about your career and how you became a benefits manager at CMC?
I’ve been in HR for about 10 years now. I started as a temporary employee in the public sector and got my start in benefits and doing health fairs. I’ve been a Benefits Manager at CMC for about 3-4 years now, and it’s been a great organization to grow with because we manage our own health plans: Our HMO plan is called Community Care Health, and we’re also self-funded on our PPO plan. So that’s definitely unique as far as benefits administration here.
How did CMC identify financial wellness as an area of focus? Were there any reasons for looking into financial wellness solutions?
CMC employees can ask HR questions through our intranet, and we started seeing a lot of questions come through as far as “How can I get a loan from my pension plan?,“”Can I get a loan from my 403(b) plan?“ or ”Can I get an advance on my paycheck?” They were trying to find ways to access short-term cash that was available to them.
Then, we started doing surveys each year to our employee population on employee benefits to find out what is most needed. We did focus groups to find out what is the benefit or education our employees need. We found that employees weren’t even taking advantage of their 403(b) plans to save for retirement.
This was much needed education for our population, and they needed short-term loans or financing to help them focus on patient care, rather than their finances. Then, [Kashable] came about through Corestream.
Corestream is a benefit administrator of mostly voluntary benefits – how was the implementation of Kashable through Corestream?
It went very seamlessly. We have Corestream set up for several other supplemental benefits that are set up through payroll deduction, and when this idea got brought up I wanted to hear more. It was very straightforward and to the point, there weren’t any hidden fees or agendas, and I thought our employees would really appreciate this benefit.
When we went through implementation, we already had our file feed built, so Corestream facilitated a lot of that back-end process, so, from an employer perspective, I actually didn’t have to do much because the files were already built. It took a month or less to get this implemented, so it was a very seamless process from the employer’s perspective.
Close to 500 employees have utilized Kashable to date, and about half of them are using Kashable to pay down other debt. Could you talk about that and some of the other statistics you’ve seen?
As far as paying down other debt, even early on, employees were using Kashable to pay off other debt, so that tells me that they were getting better interest rates through Kashable. To me, that’s a positive, smart financial move if they’re using Kashable through payroll deductions to pay off other high interest loans.
I found that a lot of people are super excited that we have this program available to them and it’s been a huge relief to have it. And it’s quick – when you actually apply and get a loan it’s 3 days or less.
How have you been communicating Kashable and other benefits to your employees? What seems to work well?
We do a targeted newsletter to our population, and we’ve been promoting the benefit that way. Word of mouth is also huge when it comes to employee benefits and there is something positive that they can take advantage of.
In addition to that, our intranet, which has links to our 403(b) and other benefits, also has “short-term loans” available. So, when they go to the site and they’re trying to reach out to their 403(b) through TransAmerica, we can say “[Kashable] is your first option you can take advantage of.” Or, when they call in, (we also have a service center) we offer that information to them if they are asking about a 403(b) loan – we ask “Did you know you had this loan available?”
So we’re trying to attack it with education through email, our intranet, phone and word of mouth.
Is there anything you can provide as far as employee feedback and the employee process?
As a benefits manager, I like to take advantage of all the benefits that we offer so I can actually speak personally to employees if they were to ask me or my team about them. I took advantage of the program right away – I had a son who was going off to college out of state and I said, “You know what, why not have some extra money and feel secure when I was traveling?” So, I took out a loan and it was so quick and easy, I thought “Oh my gosh, this is too good to be true.”
As the program has grown, I had somebody in my HR office ask me “What is that loan everyone keeps talking about?” She kept hearing about it through word of mouth and as employees kept asking and calling about it. I was able to explain, “That’s the loan through Kashable! It’s so easy, if you need funds, you’ll get them within three days if you’re approved.”
She was nervous that she wouldn’t get approved, but I said go ahead and try it – you can pick the loan amount you want on a sliding scale and it’s really easy. Her husband owns his own business and they were a bit behind because they were waiting for a big check to come. So, they just needed something to pay rent. She almost didn’t believe me at first, but once the funds came, she said “you don’t understand what a lifesaver that program was for me.”
I just thought that was an awesome story because they were going to have to borrow from friends or family just to pay rent and other bills they had due. She thanked me several times because of how easy it was – it was a big lifesaver for her.
Would you recommend Kashable to other employers or other hospital systems? If so, why?
I most definitely would. I think this is a great program to help employees not worry about short term financial stress so they can focus on their jobs. Our focus is patient care, so our goal is to remove any barriers that would prevent them from focusing on that. So, if their families are taken care of, their finances are taken care of, that’s one step the employer can take to help them achieve [focus]. They feel [financially] secure at home and at work.
It’s been a lifesaver for some of our employees, and they’ve been able to get themselves out of bad debt with a lower interest rate. It’s a smarter financial move for them so it gives them more financial security. They know what’s going to be coming out of their paychecks, so they know it’s not something they’re going to default on. As long as they’re working it’s going to come out of their check just like other direct deposits. I would definitely recommend Kashable to other employers because I think their employees would appreciate it as much as we do.
What’s next for Community Medical Centers?
There’s been a huge focus on education, tuition reimbursement and educating employees about the benefits available around student loans. We’re actually partnering with a company called GradFin, and they are going to offer education and refinancing on student loans, as well as allowing our employees to be able to pay them back through payroll deduction. In the medical field, a lot of people have gone to school and have loans that they need to pay off, so this is the next step we’re moving towards as far as financial wellness.