There are two places to set up employee waiting period rules in the system. The first is located in Settings > Benefit Management > Waiting Period Rules. This should be considered the global waiting period rules.
The alternate location of waiting period rules is at the benefit level. For more information, you can refer to the following article.
The rules placed at this level will be for all employees within the system and will directly affect the benefit eligibility date they are saved with.
If no waiting period exists in the system and employees gain benefits on their hire date, administrators should create a rule on this page that tells the system that all employees get benefits zero-days from their hire date.
Eligibility rules can be used to administer a longer or shorter waiting period for employees in different states or departments as well. There are 13 separate benefit eligibility rules that can be used with employee eligibility rules if needed. Some rules may come with the days/months that employees must wait whereas others are generic and do not need specific days/months entered.
Important: The rules placed here should be the first time an employee would ever be eligible for benefits. If an employee gets basic life from their employer on hire date but medical, dental and vision benefits 30 days from date of hire, the waiting period rule here should state that employees have to wait 0 days from hire date. At the benefit level you will place a 30 days from date of hire rule on medical, dental, and vision. Administrators would never place a 30 day rule here and then a 0 days from hire date rule on the basic life benefit. This should be considered like a waterfall where the waiting period rules in this section encompass the top pond.
I.E. If the employee gets basic life and AD&D on the hire date, then the waiting period rules for the system under Settings > Benefit Management > Waiting Period Rules should have that rule placed there. That tab in the system should always have the employees earliest eligibility set. If any benefits differ from this waiting period rule and employees need to wait for Medical or dental benefits any time after date of hire like first of the month after 30 days or 60 days, the rule should be applied here at the benefit level. Step 5 - Waiting period rules within the benefit is the waiting rule for that specific benefit. If this rule is the same as the package or system rule then no rule is needed. Eligibility rules can be applied here as well if employees have waiting period rules specified by department, employee type or status.
