My daughter is just breaking out into the world, and I am not sure how to advise her on this one issue / question: She has some health issues that involve some expensive treatments to keep things under control. Assuming a prospective employer were to talk salary and benefits, how should she approach questions that would delve into coverage before and after the individual deductible? Should she just be forthright and ask? Maybe before getting into such nitty gritty, she should ask for insurance literature she could review?
Bottom line, she does not want to appear pushy nor presumptuous. Sometimes, interviewers delve into benefits lightly even if they’re not ready to make an offer. So, just how would you approach this, if you were in her shoes?
Wait till she gets an offer. Then be aggressive about wanting chance to review their coverage. She should not accept the offer nor stop other interviews until she’s had the chance to review it
Non HR interviewers will probably not know the details of the coverage. The offer letter should contain full details of benefits - don’t believe anything not in it. There should be a link to coverage. I wouldn’t even trust HR people about the intricate details of the coverage. They will do the best they can, but the documentation is the final word.
But the last thing she wants to do is to give a reason for them to reject her, especially these days.
Yeah, it’s none of their business what her health issues are. I had a boss who’d veto any applicant who he thought would be “high maintenance”, but we successfully kept any issues from him.
I agree, wait for an offer, then ask who their insurance carrier is. You can ask the HR people, or the insurance company directly, what their package is and what it covers.
She should not bring it up at all during the interview process. Once she has an offer letter she can ask for details about the health plan if she wants.
How about researching the company on Glassdoor? There’s reviews of most major companies on there and quite a few smaller ones. There’s also interview tips from people who have interviewed there and they may let you know if there’s any ‘gotcha!’ questions during the interview.
I’m not shilling for them. I’m job hunting myself. I wouldn’t ask about benefits during an initial HR screening but I would if things get serious. Companies that are proud of their benefits will often mention it anyway (that’s to cushion you about the pay offer)
The folks doing the interview won’t know that level of detail, about every plan offered by the company, especially not off the top of their head.
She can ask if they’d forward the insurance details, but there’s really nothing to be gained by trying to get those details before an offer has even been made, and potentially much to lose.
As others have pointed out, there’s a good chance whoever is involved in interviewing candidates won’t have a thorough understanding of the benefits offered by the company. There’s certainly nothing wrong with a candidate asking about benefits and I think our recruiters would refer them to a member of our benefits team should they desire more details. That said, it’s probably best to wait until she has an offer before she delves too deeply into potential benefits packages.
And, honestly, while I’m not a benefits specialist I cover benefits during new employee orientation and I answer questions employees have from time to time. When someone has questions regarding coverage of specific medications or treatments I forward them to customer service. I am simply not prepared to answer some questions.
A lot of companies do provide benefits documentation, or a link to view the information, at the point of offer. (That is one of the things I do in my system implementation work.)
So, if the company that she is interviewing at doesn’t do that as a matter of course, it should be OK to ask for it.
I’ve used Glassdoor, and it is a good resource (but beware of grumblers) but unless the company is very small, interview questions at one location may not be the same as those in another location. I’ve never worked for a place which standardized questions. Hell, the questions I asked depended strongly on the candidate.
However if you see lots of “the benefits suck” comments on Glassdoor, be warned.