Benefit Subgroup Configuration Area - Knowledge Base | BerniePortal

Benefit Subgroup Configuration Area

About this page

After you create a benefit subgroup, use the Configure page to set the subgroup’s identity, deductions, documents, welcome content, and (when enabled) contribution amounts. Plans are attached on Current Offer and Upcoming Offer, not on this page.

Who can configure

Employers with Benefits enabled, and Benefits Feature Admins with access to the subgroup, can edit and save. Users masquerading as the employer use the employer path. Brokers and other broker-or-above users can open the page in view-only mode; fields are disabled and Save changes is not available.

Open the Configure page

For employers:
  1. Select Benefits in the top navigation menu.
  2. Select Subgroups in the secondary navigation menu.
  3. In the BENEFITS SUBGROUPS column, select the subgroup name.
For Benefits Feature Admins, select Benefits in the top navigation menu (BerniePortal opens the Subgroups list), then select the subgroup name.

BerniePortal opens the subgroup with tertiary navigation that includes Offer Overview, Current Offer, Upcoming Offer, and Configure. Configure is selected by default when you open the subgroup from the list.

For an overview of the Subgroups list, see Understanding the Benefits Subgroups Area.

Subgroup Information

Under Subgroup Information:
  • Subgroup Name (required) — rename the subgroup.
  • Subgroup FEIN (required) — enter the tax ID for the subgroup.
  • Number of Deductions (required) — choose how many times premiums are deducted per year. Options include Weekly (52 deductions), Biweekly (26 deductions), Semi Monthly (24 deductions), Monthly (12 deductions), and 48, 10, 9, 18, or 20 deductions. For more detail, see Viewing and Editing a Subgroup's Number of Pay Periods.
  • COBRA: — check This is a COBRA subgroup when this subgroup is for COBRA / state continuation. When checked, Number of Deductions is locked to Monthly (12 pays). For the full COBRA setup flow, see Creating a COBRA Subgroup.
  • 2% Administration Fee: — when the subgroup is marked as COBRA, check Automatically add to premiums to add the fee to premiums.
  • Reference Code: — read-only code assigned to the subgroup.
  • Spousal Surcharge — shown when the employer has Spousal Surcharge enabled under Benefits settings. Enter the per-pay-period surcharge amount.

If you change Number of Deductions after offers are configured, selecting Save changes opens Update Contributions After Changing Deductions. Changing deductions does not recalculate contributions. Select Change Deductions to continue, then review employee and employer contribution amounts on Current Offer - Benefits and How to Configure Upcoming Offer - Benefits.

Welcome Page

Under Welcome Page:
  • Description — text employees see at the start of enrollment (placeholder: Welcome to your benefit enrollment...).
  • YouTube Video URL — optional video link (placeholder: www.youtube.com).

Documents

Under Documents:
  • Summary plan description (SPD)* — upload a PDF using Drag and drop your file(s) here or click to browse. Only one SPD file can be uploaded at a time. Use the actions menu Delete to remove a pending upload.
  • Documents to show at the beginning of enrollment — upload enrollment PDFs the same way. To remove one document, open the actions menu on that row and select Delete. To remove every enrollment document, select Delete All, then confirm Delete All Documents?.

Enrollment and SPD uploads must be PDF files.

Contributions

Contribution fields appear only when Defined Contribution is enabled for the employer and the subgroup is not marked as a COBRA subgroup. Which fields you see depends on Benefits settings:
  • Health Contributions — Health Contribution (per pay period amount) when health and ancillary contributions are split.
  • Defined Contribution — Defined Contribution (per pay period amount) for a single contribution amount.
  • Ancillary Contributions — Bucket #N Contribution (per pay period amount) fields for each configured bucket, plus View/Hide Ancillary Bucket to show or hide the ancillary bucket table.

Save or cancel

When you finish editing:
  1. Select Save changes at the bottom of the page.
  2. Or select Cancel changes to leave without saving.

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