If your company offers benefits through Gusto (including the broker integration), benefits-eligible employees can view and manage your plans in the Benefits section of your Gusto account.
Whether you're a new hire or your company is in open enrollment, we email all eligible employees when it’s time to choose or waive benefits. Each employee must complete their own enrollment or waiver in Gusto. If you're not enrolling in coverage, it's important that you sign a waiver in Gusto so the insurance carrier can verify whether your company meets their participation requirements.
Choose carefully—the only times you can add, remove, or change coverage are when you're newly hired, in open enrollment, or have experienced a qualifying life event.
Depending on the type of enrollment window you're in, here's how much time benefits-eligible employees have to choose plans in Gusto.
New hire enrollment
Open enrollment
Qualifying life event
Step 1: Get started
Step 2: Verify your personal info
Verify your info for the insurance carrier’s records and enter your dependents’ info if you want to see pricing for them. If you’re waiving coverage, you’ll do so on the next page.
The next page lists each type of benefit that your company offers. When you click Enroll or Waive, you’ll be presented with the plan options and pricing for each benefit.
Step 3: Choose or waive medical coverage
Step 4: Choose or waive the remaining lines of coverage
Step 5: Review your selections and understand the cost summary
Step 6: Add waiver reasons and extra info
Step 7: Review and confirm your selections
What comes next
Follow these steps if your company is currently in open enrollment with Gusto and you want to opt out of coverage. Your company needs you to sign a waiver in Gusto because the insurance carriers keep track of waiver reasons to determine your company’s eligibility for coverage.
If your company is not in open enrollment but you've experienced a qualifying life event, follow these steps to cancel coverage.
Health insurance carriers require a minimum percentage of all eligible employees to enroll in the employer-sponsored health benefit plan. If an employee chooses to decline coverage for a valid waiver reason, then they are excluded from the total employee count and not counted against the participation requirement.
Examples of valid waiver reasons accepted by most carriers include:
Note: Having individual health insurance is not considered a valid waiver by most carriers.