HealthCues offers a supplemental preventive care program that works alongside major medical coverage. For eligible employers, a qualifying Section 125 arrangement may generate payroll tax savings. If those savings exceed program costs, the net amount could help fund your existing health benefits while employees gain access to supplemental preventive care benefits.

How cost increases compare across industries

Aon projects a 9.5% increase in U.S. employer health care costs for 2027 before mitigation. Its industry breakdown below covers projected changes from 2025 to 2026, not industry forecasts for 2027.

Source: Aon, August 20, 2026. Employee payroll contributions exclude deductibles, copays and coinsurance.

Retail and wholesale employers face increases on both sides of the benefits budget: 7.7% for employers and 6.6% for employee contributions. Manufacturing’s corresponding figures are 7.5% and 5.3%. Finance and insurance has the highest employer increase shown, at 9.8%.

For your business, these benchmarks provide context for the renewal conversation. Your own plan costs, covered population, and renewal terms determine the dollars you need to fund. Employees’ out-of-pocket exposure also matters when deciding how much more to ask them to contribute.

Use potential HealthCues savings to support affordability

Net employer savings could give you room to absorb more of a premium increase, limit an increase in employee payroll deductions, or help fund a richer plan design with lower employee cost sharing. Those are choices you could make with the savings; HealthCues does not itself lower your medical renewal rate or automatically pay employees’ deductibles.

What a partial cost offset could look like

Consider an employer with $1 million in annual employer-paid health plan costs. A hypothetical 9.5% increase would add $95,000 to the next year’s budget, assuming the covered population and other factors stay constant.

Now suppose a review of a HealthCues proposal identifies $500 in annual net employer savings per participant after all program fees and applicable costs. With 100 employees participating for the full year, that would create $50,000 to apply toward the increase.

Hypothetical example only. The $500 savings assumption is not a HealthCues quote, expected result or guarantee. The 9.5% assumption uses Aon’s national forecast, not a company-specific renewal.

The hypothetical $50,000 could help absorb costs that might otherwise be passed to employees, leaving $45,000 to address. Participation matters: with 50 participants and the same assumed net savings, the offset would be $25,000, or about 26% of the increase.

Start with net savings and the employee experience

Qualified pre-tax contributions under a qualifying Section 125 plan can reduce wages subject to certain payroll taxes. The employer’s actual net result depends on wage levels, eligibility, participation, plan selection, and all program costs. Compare the resulting annual savings with your actual added employer cost over the same period.

Employees also need a clear explanation of the preventive care benefits and the full impact on their paychecks, including contributions, taxes, fees and any benefit payments. Pre-tax treatment alone does not guarantee higher take-home pay. Reducing Social Security-covered wages can also affect future retirement, disability and survivor benefits.

See how much of your increase HealthCues could help cover

Bring your renewal figures and employee census to HealthCues, along with your broker and payroll lead. Compare net employer savings at realistic participation levels with the increase you want to absorb, and review employee outcomes across wage bands.

Your CPA and benefits counsel should review the actual plan documents and tax treatment, including any benefit payments. For a unionized workforce, include applicable collective bargaining requirements in that review.

Contact HealthCues to explore whether a supplemental preventive care program could help fund part of your rising benefits costs and give you more flexibility in supporting your employees in 2027.

Industry data and 2027 forecast: Aon release, August 20, 2026

General tax background: IRS cafeteria plan FAQs

EXECUTIVE TAKEAWAY: Accessible care can strengthen retention and hiring only when it complements responsible staffing, reasonable workloads, capable managers, and clear privacy protections.

Retention and hiring are usually managed as separate activities. Recruiting fills vacancies; benefits manages coverage; operations drives output; finance controls labor cost. Employees experience them as one system. The conditions under which they work, the support they can access, and the credibility of the employer’s promises shape whether they join, perform, and stay.

Capacity Is More Than Headcount

The macroeconomic cost of poor mental health is substantial. The World Health Organization estimates that depression and anxiety cause 12 billion lost working days globally each year and approximately $1 trillion in lost productivity.^[5] In the United States, Gallup found that workers who rated their mental health as fair or poor reported nearly 12 unplanned absence days annually, compared with 2.5 days for other workers. Gallup estimated the resulting lost productivity at $47.6 billion a year.^[6]

These figures matter to hiring because a vacancy is not the only capacity problem. A company can be fully staffed on paper while losing output through absence, presenteeism, burnout, errors, and disengagement. Gallup’s 2026 State of the Global Workplace report found global employee engagement at 20% in 2025 and estimated that low engagement cost the world economy about $10 trillion, or 9% of global GDP.^[7] These global figures are not a forecast for one company; they signal that workforce capacity depends on more than headcount.

Make the Employer Value Proposition Credible

Mental health also influences the employer value proposition. Candidates evaluate salary, workload, flexibility, manager quality, health coverage, access to care, and whether the culture appears sustainable. An employer that advertises well-being while tolerating chronic overload creates reputational risk. An employer that combines responsible work design with usable health resources gives candidates a more credible reason to choose the organization, and employees a stronger reason to remain.

Access Is the Product

Usability is the key distinction. The original HealthCues article correctly notes that offering benefits does not guarantee access. Employees may face cost concerns, long wait times, limited provider availability, transportation barriers, inflexible schedules, confusion, stigma, or confidentiality concerns. Gallup similarly found that 57% of U.S. workers could not confirm that easily accessible mental-health support was available through their employer: 24% said it was unavailable, and 33% did not know.^[6] A benefit that employees cannot find, trust, schedule, or afford has limited recruiting or retention value.

For this reason, benefit strategy should be evaluated as an operating system rather than a catalog. The objective is to shorten the distance between an employee recognizing a need and receiving appropriate support. A coordinated model may include health assessments, behavioral and health coaching, teletherapy, 24/7 telemedicine, preventive screenings, health education, digital navigation, and supplemental benefits. Virtual access can be particularly valuable for shift workers, caregivers, rural employees, and people with limited local providers.

Measure the Mechanism

The business case should remain disciplined. No single benefit will eliminate turnover, reduce every medical claim, or repair a harmful workplace. Instead, leaders should define the mechanism they expect to influence. Faster access may reduce time away from work. Earlier intervention may prevent a manageable condition from becoming a longer absence. Navigation may improve awareness and use. Coaching may support sustained behavior change. Confidential behavioral-health access may help employees seek support before burnout becomes resignation.

Measure the system through a balanced scorecard. On the talent side, track applicant acceptance, new-hire retention, first-year turnover, time-to-fill, internal mobility, and regrettable exits. On the health and capacity side, track benefit awareness, utilization, access time, absence, disability duration, return-to-work outcomes, and employee-reported ability to obtain care. On the financial side, track direct recruiting cost, vacancy days, temporary labor, overtime, training, time to proficiency, and avoided replacement cost.

An executive dashboard should segment results. Companywide averages can conceal the populations experiencing the greatest friction. Review outcomes by location, shift, job family, manager, tenure, and workforce type. A telehealth program may produce limited change in a headquarters population with strong local access but meaningful value for rural sites or night-shift employees. Scheduling changes may matter more in frontline operations than in professional roles. Manager training may have the highest leverage where turnover clusters under specific leaders.

Trust Is a Business Requirement

Leaders should also protect trust. Employees are more likely to use mental-health resources when privacy, voluntariness, and data boundaries are clear. Communications should explain what information is collected, who can see it, what is reported to the employer, how to access urgent help, and how to opt in or out. Personal health information should never be used in employment decisions. A strong benefit can fail if employees believe participation will affect advancement or job security.

An Integrated C-Suite Agenda

The C-suite agenda is therefore broader than buying a program. First, diagnose where hiring and retention costs are concentrated. Second, remove preventable workplace stressors such as unreasonable workloads, inadequate staffing, poor communication, and unpredictable scheduling. Third, give managers the capacity and training to hold meaningful conversations, recognize performance, clarify priorities, and respond to concerns. Fourth, provide accessible whole-person health resources. Fifth, communicate them clearly. Finally, measure outcomes rather than enrollment.

Apply the Investment Test

This approach changes the investment question. Instead of asking whether the organization can afford another employee-health resource, ask whether the resource addresses a documented source of absence, turnover, or hiring disadvantage, and whether its cost is lower than the capacity it protects. For a critical employee whose replacement may cost 80% or 200% of salary, the threshold for a positive return can be surprisingly modest.

Where HealthCues Fits

HealthCues can support this strategy by helping employers connect employees with preventive, behavioral, and virtual-care resources through a more coordinated experience. Benefits do not replace leadership. It is that accessible care can complement healthier work design, reduce friction in seeking support, and strengthen the overall employee experience.

The Executive Conclusion

The executive conclusion: workforce health, hiring economics, and retention economics belong in the same conversation. Organizations that manage them together can make better benefit decisions, reduce avoidable talent loss, and build capacity without relying exclusively on repeated external hiring. In a market where every vacancy carries direct cost and every departure can disrupt performance, supporting employees earlier is not only compassionate. It is financially responsible.

SOURCE NOTES

Research and Benchmark Sources

Current benchmarks were checked against publisher or institutional sources available as of August 4, 2026.

[1] Society for Human Resource Management. “SHRM Releases 2025 Benchmarking Reports: How Does Your Organization Compare?” October 15, 2025.

[2] Society for Human Resource Management. “Optimize Your Hiring Strategy with Business-Driven Recruiting.” 2025 benchmark cited.

[3] Training Magazine. “2025 Training Industry Report.” November 10, 2025.

[4] Gallup. “42% of Employee Turnover Is Preventable but Often Ignored.” Updated February 16, 2026.

[5] World Health Organization. “Mental Health at Work.” Fact sheet updated September 2, 2024.

[6] Gallup. “The Economic Cost of Poor Employee Mental Health.” December 13, 2022.

[7] Gallup. “State of the Global Workplace 2026.” Published 2026.

Editorial note: Benchmarks are directional and should be supplemented with company-specific data on role mix, compensation, vacancy duration, time to proficiency, productivity, customer impact, and avoidable turnover.

EXECUTIVE TAKEAWAY: A 1,000-person organization with 15% voluntary turnover and $80,000 average compensation can face an illustrative $7.2 million in annual replacement exposure at a 60% blended cost assumption.

For many leadership teams, turnover appears in separate budget lines: recruiting, overtime, onboarding, training, temporary labor, and manager time. That structure hides the larger business event. When a capable employee leaves, the organization loses productive capacity and then pays to rebuild it. The cost can touch margin, customer continuity, execution speed, team stability, and growth. The retention conversation therefore should include not only how people are managed, but also whether employees can address health needs before those needs become absences, burnout, or another reason to leave.

The Cost Stack Is Bigger Than Recruiting

SHRM’s 2025 benchmarking research reports an average cost-per-hire of $5,475 for nonexecutive positions and $35,879 for executive positions.[1] SHRM also reports an average time-to-fill of approximately six weeks.[2] During that interval, work is delayed, redistributed, or covered at a premium. Once a candidate accepts, the company still must onboard, train, and wait for full productivity. Training magazine’s 2025 industry report estimates average expenditure of about $874 per learner across surveyed employers.[3]

Replacement costs rise further when vacancy losses, ramp-up time, customer disruption, lost knowledge, and pressure on remaining employees are included. Gallup estimates that replacing a frontline employee costs roughly 40% of salary, a technical professional about 80%, and a leader or manager around 200%.[4] Every avoidable exit therefore creates a hurdle rate for retention investment. If a practical intervention helps preserve a high-value employee’s capacity, the economics can be meaningful.

Benefits Have Value Only When Employees Can Use Them

This is where benefits strategy can underperform. Employees may still face long waits, limited providers, inconvenient schedules, transportation barriers, confusion about where to begin, or privacy concerns. A benefit that exists on paper but is difficult to access has limited value to the employee and limited strategic value to the employer. HealthCues is designed to reduce that friction through multiple entry points. Depending on the program, employees may have access to health assessments, health and behavioral coaching, teletherapy, 24/7 telemedicine, preventive screenings, health education, digital health resources, and supplemental benefits. The value is not simply the number of services offered. It is giving employees a practical next step when a health concern, stressor, or question appears.

Turn Access Into a Retention Asset

Different services create value in different ways. Assessments can help identify concerns earlier. Coaching can support stress management and healthier habits. Teletherapy can make behavioral-health support easier to reach around work and caregiving. Telemedicine can reduce unnecessary travel and time away. Screenings and education can encourage earlier awareness, while digital resources can make the program easier to navigate.

For executives, the more useful definition of benefit value is not how many products sit in the portfolio, but how effectively employees can move from “I need help” to an appropriate resource. That matters especially for shift workers, remote employees, caregivers, rural populations, and employees with limited local provider access. When support is convenient, understandable, and trusted, the employer’s investment becomes more visible in the employee experience.

Protect Capacity Before a Resignation

Gallup’s 2026 update found that 42% of employees who voluntarily left during the prior year believed their manager or organization could have done something to prevent the departure.[4] A HealthCues analysis also identifies excessive workloads, inadequate staffing, unpredictable schedules, poor communication, limited job control, and lack of manager support as common workplace stressors.

Benefits cannot solve those operating problems. But accessible health support can address a different part of the risk: employees dealing with stress, sleep problems, anxiety, caregiving pressure, or physical-health concerns that begin to affect focus, attendance, and performance. Earlier access can provide more options before a manageable issue becomes a longer absence, a crisis, or a decision to leave.

Build a Two-Layer Retention Strategy

The strongest retention strategy has two layers. The first is healthy work design: reasonable workloads, adequate staffing, clear expectations, capable managers, psychological safety, and flexibility where the work permits it. The second is accessible whole-person support. HealthCues fits in this second layer by helping employers make preventive, behavioral, and virtual-care resources easier to find and use. Together, the two layers address both the conditions of work and an employee’s ability to manage health needs while remaining productive and connected.

Quantify the Retention Economics

Consider an illustrative 1,000-person business with average annual compensation of $80,000 and 15% voluntary turnover. That equals 150 departures a year. If blended replacement cost is conservatively modeled at 60% of salary, annual turnover exposure is $7.2 million. Preventing only 15 exits would avoid approximately $720,000 in replacement costs before considering customer relationships, revenue protection, reduced overtime, or management distraction. The point is not to attribute every retained employee to a health benefit. It is to establish an investment test: where are replacement costs, absence, burnout, access barriers, or benefit confusion most visible, and what would it cost to improve support for those populations? HealthCues can then be evaluated against specific workforce-capacity risks rather than as a generic wellness expense.

Make the Benefits Experience Visible

A strong program also has to be understood. Employees need clear communication about what is available, how to access it, whether participation is voluntary, and how personal information is protected. Leaders should treat benefit navigation and communication as part of the product. The same principle applies in recruiting: a list of benefits is less persuasive than a credible explanation of how employees can actually obtain care around work and family demands.

Use an Executive-Grade Scorecard

The C-suite should measure workforce outcomes and benefit performance together. Track regrettable turnover, first-year attrition, time-to-fill, absence, disability duration, internal mobility, and time to proficiency. Then add benefit awareness, utilization by service, access time, employee-reported ease of use, and results by location, shift, or job family. The goal is not maximum utilization of every service. It is appropriate use, earlier access, and evidence that support is reaching the populations where it can create the most value.

Where HealthCues Fits

The executive decision is not whether benefits alone can fix retention. They cannot. The question is whether the organization is paying repeatedly to rebuild talent while employees face avoidable friction in getting support.

HealthCues gives employers a practical way to strengthen the support side of the retention equation through preventive care, behavioral-health resources, teletherapy, telemedicine, coaching, screenings, education, digital tools, and supplemental benefits. Combined with responsible leadership and healthy job design, that makes benefits more than an expense line. It makes them part of a strategy to protect workforce capacity, demonstrate value to employees, and reduce the cost of rebuilding talent.

SOURCE NOTES

Research and Benchmark Sources

Current benchmarks were checked against publisher or institutional sources available as of August 4, 2026.

[1] Society for Human Resource Management. “SHRM Releases 2025 Benchmarking Reports: How Does Your Organization Compare?” October 15, 2025.

[2] Society for Human Resource Management. “Optimize Your Hiring Strategy with Business-Driven Recruiting.” 2025 benchmark cited.

[3] Training Magazine. “2025 Training Industry Report.” November 10, 2025.

[4] Gallup. “42% of Employee Turnover Is Preventable but Often Ignored.” Updated February 16, 2026.

[5] World Health Organization. “Mental Health at Work.” Fact sheet updated September 2, 2024.

[6] Gallup. “The Economic Cost of Poor Employee Mental Health.” December 13, 2022.

[7] Gallup. “State of the Global Workplace 2026.” Published 2026.

Editorial note: Benchmarks are directional and should be supplemented with company-specific data on role mix, compensation, vacancy duration, time to proficiency, productivity, customer impact, and avoidable turnover.