IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising)

Consolidating broker services to one point of contact

When we first met the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA), they had three different policies – group life assurance, private medical and group income protection – across three different brokers.

While this isn’t unusual, it can be an administrative headache; and this means that companies are much less likely to review their existing policies to make sure they are fit for purpose.

So, task one was to consolidate these; something we managed to do while also delivering cost savings for the business and simultaneously enhancing the three core benefits policies for the IPA’s 65 employees.

After identifying other areas for improvement, we helped the IPA to wind up its existing optical plan and switch to a more flexible health cash plan, which can be used for a range of routine health appointments including eye tests, dental check-ups and physiotherapy sessions. Employees receive an annual limit to spend on each type of treatment.

This is a high-value plan for employees, especially now the maximum waiting time for non-urgent, consultant-led treatments on the NHS is 18 weeks. As such, the IPA has seen a 90% take up of its new health cash plan since launch.

The IPA understand that effective communication is crucial in increasing engagement between employees and the benefits that they are offered. As such we have begun work to identify, implement and roll out a new online platform which will allow employees to interact with their benefits in a simple and engaging way.