Does the benefits module deduct a premium from payroll?

No. Benefits holds no money at all — there is no premium, contribution or cost field anywhere in it, and nothing in the module is read by payroll. If your organisation recovers an employee contribution from salary, that is a payroll adjustment recorded separately in Payroll, and it is not driven from here.

Can a manager see who on their team is enrolled?

No, and this is the one module where that is true. Managers get no read at all — not the roster, not their own reports' rows, not the dependant counts. A benefit election is closer to a medical fact than to a work output, so only the person themselves and an HR admin can see it. The database grants managers no access, so it is not something a future screen could accidentally expose.

What does retiring a plan actually do?

It stops the plan taking anyone new. It does NOT end the cover of anyone already on it — every existing standing stays exactly as it is until it is ended individually. Retiring is permanent; a retired plan can never be brought back.

Can I delete a plan or an enrolment that was recorded by mistake?

No. Nothing in Benefits can be deleted, by anyone, including an administrator. An enrolment record answers "was this person covered on the day they went to hospital", and a record that can be erased cannot answer that. A plan is retired; a standing is ended.

Can I change a plan's cover dates after people have joined?

You can widen the window, but not narrow it past somebody already recorded against it. If an enrolment would fall outside the new dates, the change is refused and says how many rows it would have stranded — otherwise the promise that every enrolment sits inside its plan's window would quietly stop being true.

Where does the covered-lives number come from?

It is counted from the rows every time the page loads — enrolled people plus their dependants. Nothing is stored, so the summary can never drift from the roster underneath it.

Why is there no premium or sum-insured field?

Because v1 would never compute against it. A number that sits on a screen looking authoritative, drifts from what the insurer actually invoices, and is validated by nothing is worse than no number. Premium calculation, claims handling and insurer integration are configured on request.

How do I run the benefit plan catalogue in ASHR.work?

Quick answer

Open Benefits → Manage plans. Click New plan for each policy you offer, giving the provider, the policy number and the dates cover runs between. Each plan then shows a live roster and a covered-lives count. Retire a plan when it stops taking anyone new.

What belongs in a plan

Name — what your team will recognise it by ("Group health cover 2026").
Kind — health, life, accident, wellness, or other. Use other rather than mislabelling something as health; a wrong label invites people to assume medical cover they do not have.
Provider and policy number — the policy number is optional, because a wellness allowance or an EAP genuinely has none, and an invented one would be worse than an honest blank.
What it covers, in your own words. This is what an employee reads before deciding, so write the answer you would give if they asked you directly.
The cover window — a first day, and a last day if the policy has one.

A new plan goes into the catalogue open, so your team can join it from the day cover starts. Setting a start date in the future is fine: the plan appears with that date on it, and nobody can join before then.

Reading the roster

Each plan carries four numbers and a list:

Enrolled — people currently covered.
Covered lives — those people plus their dependants. This is the figure an insurer usually asks for.
Declined — people who were offered the plan and said no.
Ended — standings that are over, kept as history.

All four are counted from the rows on every page load. There is no stored total anywhere in the module, so a summary that disagrees with the list beneath it is not a state this screen can reach.

Retiring a plan

Retiring says one thing only: this plan takes nobody new. It deliberately does not touch anyone's existing cover, because a button that quietly cancelled everybody's health insurance would be the worst thing this module could do. The confirmation dialog lists exactly what will happen, including how many people are currently on the plan.

Retirement is permanent. A retired plan cannot be brought back, and neither a plan nor an enrolment can be deleted by anyone.

What this module is not

Benefits v1 is enrolment administration. It does not calculate premiums, handle claims, or integrate with an insurer's systems, and it does not deduct anything from pay — there is no money field in it at all. Those are real needs, and they are configured on request; listing them here as though they shipped would be the one thing that makes the rest of this page untrustworthy.

Frequently asked questions

Does the benefits module deduct a premium from payroll?: No. Benefits holds no money at all — there is no premium, contribution or cost field anywhere in it, and nothing in the module is read by payroll. If your organisation recovers an employee contribution from salary, that is a payroll adjustment recorded separately in Payroll, and it is not driven from here.
Can a manager see who on their team is enrolled?: No, and this is the one module where that is true. Managers get no read at all — not the roster, not their own reports' rows, not the dependant counts. A benefit election is closer to a medical fact than to a work output, so only the person themselves and an HR admin can see it. The database grants managers no access, so it is not something a future screen could accidentally expose.
What does retiring a plan actually do?: It stops the plan taking anyone new. It does NOT end the cover of anyone already on it — every existing standing stays exactly as it is until it is ended individually. Retiring is permanent; a retired plan can never be brought back.
Can I delete a plan or an enrolment that was recorded by mistake?: No. Nothing in Benefits can be deleted, by anyone, including an administrator. An enrolment record answers "was this person covered on the day they went to hospital", and a record that can be erased cannot answer that. A plan is retired; a standing is ended.
Can I change a plan's cover dates after people have joined?: You can widen the window, but not narrow it past somebody already recorded against it. If an enrolment would fall outside the new dates, the change is refused and says how many rows it would have stranded — otherwise the promise that every enrolment sits inside its plan's window would quietly stop being true.
Where does the covered-lives number come from?: It is counted from the rows every time the page loads — enrolled people plus their dependants. Nothing is stored, so the summary can never drift from the roster underneath it.
Why is there no premium or sum-insured field?: Because v1 would never compute against it. A number that sits on a screen looking authoritative, drifts from what the insurer actually invoices, and is validated by nothing is worse than no number. Premium calculation, claims handling and insurer integration are configured on request.

This guide also lives in the help centre at /help/benefits/how-to-run-the-benefit-plan-catalogue, which is its canonical home.