The Total Cost of an Offer, Including Benefits
An offer competing against an employer with a far weaker plan is stronger than the salary comparison suggests. The document that proves it already exists.
How it works in practice
An offer competing against an employer with a far weaker plan is stronger than the salary comparison suggests. The document that proves it already exists.
That document is the total compensation statement: the employer share of premiums, account funding and paid time, stated per employee. Put it in front of a candidate who is comparing salaries alone and the comparison changes.
The same view works internally. When you review pay against the market, review the whole package, not only the salary line.
Used well, it keeps you from overpaying on salary to win candidates when the benefits are already doing part of that work.
Three places to go next
Total compensation statements
Show employees the full value of the package.
Total compensation calculator
Add up salary and employer-paid benefits.
Compensation strategy
Pay and benefits designed as one budget.
Questions employers ask.
What is in the total cost of an offer?
Salary plus the employer share of premiums, account funding and paid time, stated for the individual.
How do we show it to a candidate?
Use a total compensation statement built from the same data as for current employees.
Does this replace a salary benchmark?
No. It sits alongside it, so the pay decision includes the benefits half of the package.
Where this comes from.
This page describes how CFH builds and times total compensation statements and related materials for employer clients. It uses no outside statistics. The related guides below cover the wider process.
Send us your renewal.
We’ll tell you whether it looks competitive, where we see opportunity, and the five questions we’d put to your carrier. No cost, and no obligation to move anything.
The renewal letter
Your current plan summary
Contribution split by tier
Enrolled counts by tier
Four documents — two more if your group is 50 or more. Nothing else; every extra one is a reason to postpone.
An independent employee benefits consulting firm. We look at the entire benefits program: cost, plan performance, risk and administration.
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