Plan sponsors look to their websites for a wide range of information, but recordkeepers have work to do regarding their design and features, say analysts who studied sites and users’ experiences.
At the recent SPARK Forum in Palm Beach, FL, Olivia Jack and Andrew Way of Corporate Insight presented their findings concerning retirement plan sites’ effectiveness and what can be done to improve it.
“Plan sponsor websites are critical to administering defined contribution plans,” said Way. And he and Jack reported that their importance is growing in requests for proposals (RFPs) and can cause a recordkeeper to win or lose business.
High Regard
Plan sponsors certainly consider their sites to be important. In fact, Jack said, 75% of the plan sponsors they studied said that their sites are “vital” to their day-to-day duties; a mere 2% consider their sits to be “not very important” or “not at all important.” In fact, they assign much more importance to their sites than the participants’ sites. And they use it, Jack said. Almost 70% of the plan sponsors said that they log in to the sponsor site at least once per week.
The plan sponsors Corporate Insight studied are far more concerned about the sponsor sites than the participant sites. Almost all — 91% — said the sponsor site is either as or more important than the participant site when they are deciding about what recordkeeper they want to serve their plan. Which means that fewer than 10% consider the plan participant site to be more important. And just 10% log in to the participant site weekly.
What they Want
More than three-quarters of the plan sponsors told Corporate Insight that the following features are important to them:
| Feature | % Considering it Important |
| Website security | 83 |
| Plan information | 81 |
| Plan administration capabilities | 80 |
| Reporting | 79 |
| Participant data and management capabilities | 77 |
| Web design and disability | 77 |
And the following attributes are important to them:
| Feature | % Considering it Important |
Clear and logical navigation |
80 |
| Total balance information for the entire plan | 79 |
| Personal information security | 78 |
| Plan investment option performance data | 77 |
| Dedicated plan rules and features page | 77 |
| Required additional security for completing certain tasks | 76 |
| Password and user ID reset capabilities | 76 |
And, Jack reported, 69% said that it is very or extremely important that they have access to key sponsor site features through a mobile platform.
But Work to Do
Plan sponsors may be sold on the importance of their sites, but “plan sponsor sites leave much room for improvement,” said Olivia, adding that “The industry is severely lacking in the plan administration category.” She added that there also can be improvement in site design, security features, and online user management capabilities and contribution funding.
“There’s certainly hope,” Way said, “for creating a better web experience and turning them to a competitive advantage.”
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