Update an Employee's Benefits

This article provides a comprehensive guide on updating employee benefits in BambooHR. It outlines the purpose of tracking benefit information, detailing how to manage an employee's status for various benefit plans. The guide includes sections on enrolling employees, marking them as not eligible, waiving benefits, withdrawing from plans, and terminating coverage. Each action is accompanied by specific instructions, effective dates, and necessary comments. Additionally, it addresses the integration with BambooHR Payroll and Benefits Administration, emphasizing the importance of aligning coverage with payroll deductions. The article also highlights the need for accurate data entry and the impact of demographic changes on eligibility. Interactive guides are available for hands-on learning.

May 28, 2026
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How do I make updates to an employee's benefits?

Purpose: As you track benefit information in BambooHR, each employee will have a status for each benefit plan on their Benefits tab. A status may change depending on the employee's eligibility and current situation. This guide will explain each status and walk you through updating the employee's status for a benefit plan.

Table of Contents

Enrolled
- What if I use BambooHR® Payroll?
- What if I use Benefits Administration?
  - Editing enrollments
Not Eligible or Eligible
Waived
Withdraw
Terminate Coverage
- What if I use BambooHR® Payroll?
  - Does an employee's termination date align with a benefit plan's coverage termination date?

Do you prefer hands-on learning? Our interactive guides will guide you through different aspects of your BambooHR experience. We have an interactive guide specifically designed to show you how to edit an employee's benefit information. You can use the link below to access this guide. All you need to do is modify the "REPLACEME" with your BambooHR subdomain, and you can get started!

https://REPLACEME.bamboohr.com/home?pendo=A_lX2jtCOkj_GSfA1L5Apo8-S1o&step=azxnCbU8nv_yX5jxSHrsyUYVWOM

Benefits Administration: When updating an employee's benefits from their Benefits tab, a warning banner will appear if any active plan lacks a plan year. All benefit plans must be associated with a plan year to ensure seamless enrollment changes and integration with carriers. Clicking Update My Plans will guide you to resolve this.

Enrolled

To enroll an eligible employee in a benefit plan, hover your cursor over the benefit plan and click on the gear icon. Select Enroll.

*Effective date: Select when the plan coverage starts for the employee. This date can be the same as the eligibility date, but remember the difference between the effective date and the eligibility date. An employee can become eligible to enroll in a benefit plan starting on a certain date, but they may enroll at a later time. The date they enroll in the plan is the effective date shown in the Benefits Overview table.
Coverage: Determine the type of coverage for this plan.
Employee Pays and Company Pays: These fields will only appear for specific plans where amounts differ for each employee (i.e., 401k).
- For retirement plans, you will also see the Annual Max field, which allows you to determine the maximum annual contribution amount. If you are using BambooHR Payroll, you must enter an amount equal to or less than the federal limits to avoid errors when saving.
Comment: If needed, you can add a comment about the enrollment. Comments are viewable in the Benefits History table.

If you schedule a future enrollment for your employees and new hires, you will need to make sure the effective date is on or after the employee's hire date and that they have an active pay schedule assigned to them. Navigate to the employee's Compensation table on their Job tab to verify this information if you come across an error.

Once you save the enrollment details, the employee will show as enrolled in the benefit plan.

*Effective date: If the employee is pre-enrolled (during open enrollment), the effective date will show the plan's start date instead of the date the employee was marked as enrolled. This is because the benefit plan does not go into effect until the plan starts, and therefore, the effective date is the same as the plan's start date. If the plan has already started, the actual enrollment date will appear.

You can only enroll an employee in one benefit plan for each benefit type. In the example above, I enrolled the employee in Blue Cross Blue Shield - Medical. If I enroll the employee in Medical Plan, the system will automatically terminate the employee's coverage for the first health plan (Blue Cross Blue Shield - Medical). You cannot enroll an employee in two benefit plans under the same benefit type.

If an employee is eligible for multiple plans and you enroll the employee in one of the plans, the system will automatically waive employee from all other plans of that type.

After you have enrolled an employee in a benefit plan, the payment amounts will appear for the specific plan based on their benefit group's deduction frequency (depending on the benefit type).

When a status update occurs, a new line will appear in the employee's Benefit History table.

What if I use BambooHR® Payroll?

Effective date: Enter when the employee can start using the benefit plan. (This setting works the same as mentioned above.) Sometimes, the effective date is the same as the enrollment date. The effective date must be on or after the employee's hire date.
Payroll deduction date: Determine when the first payroll deduction should occur. This field will ask you to confirm the first pay date on which the scheduled deduction will occur. By default, this will show the date that corresponds to what you have selected in the benefit plan's settings. If you need to override this, you can do so by selecting a new date. The system will let you know if this new date falls on a scheduled pay date or not. If you choose a date that does not align with a pay date, the deduction will occur during the first payroll run after the selected date.
Coverage: Select the coverage option elected by your employee.

If you enroll an employee in a variable rate plan when they are part of a pay schedule that syncs with Payroll, you will not be able to change the currency to something other than USD. USD is the currency required for syncing an employee with Payroll.

You can also edit enrollments for an employee who is a part of a syncing pay schedule on the Pay Info tab (under the Deductions section).

When using Payroll, please note that any updates made to benefit contributions will need to sync with Payroll before applying them to your payroll run. This means if you have a payroll open when making an update to an employee's benefit contributions, you will need to reset the employee's payroll for the contributions to appear correctly in Payroll.

What if I use Benefits Administration?

When using Benefits Administration, enrolling employees from the Benefits tab follows the same process as outlined above. However, for variable rate plans, there is an additional requirement of including any applicable coverage options that the employee has selected.

Based on your benefit plan setup, the Enroll modal for voluntary life insurance plans may include an EOI Status field, which defaults to No EOI Required. If you set the status to Pending and save the enrollment, an EOI Pending tag appears on the employee profile but not on the Elections tab. For future-dated enrollments, no EOI Pending tag or pending coverage amounts will show on the employee profile. They will only show up if the enrollment record is active (approved) and EOI is pending.

If the unsupported coverage error appears for an employee, click here to learn how to update their unsupported coverage level to a supported coverage level.

Editing enrollments

When editing an employee's existing enrollment, be sure to complete all required fields (e.g., effective date, coverage amounts, etc.) to maintain data accuracy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk. Please note that the enrollment effective date must be within the plan's start and end dates and an existing plan year's effective dates. After filling out all necessary information, you can click Save to upload the edited enrollment details.

Updating EOI Status on the Benefits tab for Voluntary Life Insurance Plans

If the approved enrollment was submitted through the employee enrollment experience, we recommend updating the EOI status from the admin approval page on the Elections tab to ensure the enrollment and Elections tab remain in sync.
If an enrollment does not already have an EOI status, the field appears and defaults to No EOI Required, which is editable.
If you set the status to Pending, an EOI Pending tag appears in the employee profile and bulk enrollment, but not on the Elections tab, and pending coverage amounts are not displayed.
If you later update the status to a status other than Pending, the EOI Pending tag is removed from the employee profile and bulk enrollment but will remain on the Elections tab until you edit the enrollment from the admin approval page and save it.

Any edits to your employee's benefit elections should be made on the approval page for the active enrollment window. Edits made to approved benefit elections outside of the enrollment window (bulk enrollment, importer, and/or employee profile) will need to be manually communicated with your carrier. The exception to this is if you have carrier connections; in that case, any changes made will reliably send all the required data to your carriers.

Not Eligible or Eligible

When an employee's demographic information qualifies them for coverage under a specific benefit plan, the plan's settings will automatically calculate the employee's eligibility, and the plan will appear on their employee profile. If you need to mark an employee as not eligible for a benefit plan, click on the action menu and then select Mark as Not Eligible.

If an employee is not eligible for a benefit plan when you initially set it up, the plan will not show up on their employee profile.

When you change an employee's demographic information according to the plan's eligibility setup to make them eligible for a benefit plan, the system will generate an event in their Benefit History table to track this change.

Enter a date in the Not Eligible as of field, and you can add a comment about the change. Click Save. Once saved, the employee's eligibility will be updated, and a new line will appear in the employee's Benefit History table.

You can set a future date in the Not Eligible as of field to have the system automatically mark the employee as not eligible on that future date.

Waived

To waive a benefit plan an employee is eligible for, hover your cursor over the benefit plan and click on the gear icon. Select Waive.

Enter a date in the Date Waived field, and you can add a comment about the change. Click Save.

Once saved, the system will waive the employee from the benefit plan, and a new line will appear in the employee's Benefit History table.

Withdraw

If an employee is enrolled in a benefit plan and decides to get coverage from another party, you can withdraw them from the benefit plan. Hover your cursor over the benefit plan and click on the gear icon. Select Withdraw.

Enter a date in the Withdrawal Date field, and you can add a comment about the change. Click Save.

Once saved, the system will withdraw the employee from the benefit plan, and a new line will appear in the employee's Benefit History table.

Terminate Coverage

If an employee is enrolled in a benefit plan and will be leaving your company, the system will generate a coverage termination date based on the benefit plan's settings once you change their employment status to "Terminated." If you need to change the coverage termination date (or if the coverage selected will end on a manually-entered date), hover your cursor over the benefit plan, click the action menu, and select Terminate Coverage.

Enter a (new) date in the Coverage Termination Date field, and you can add a comment about the change. Click Save.

Once saved, the termination date will show next to the plan in the Benefits Overview table, and a new line will appear in the employee's Benefit History table.

You can review the employee's Benefits History table to confirm the details of their terminated coverage.

What if I use BambooHR® Payroll?

When you select the Terminate Coverage option, a few extra fields will appear. Similar to enrolling an employee with benefits when using Payroll, you will be able to override the deduction end date. The system sets it to a default date based on the benefit plan's settings, but you can adjust the date.

You can also terminate coverage under the Deductions section on the employee's Pay Info tab.

Does an employee's termination date align with a benefit plan's coverage termination date?

A benefit plan's coverage termination date does not always align with the employee's termination date. Therefore, when you end employment for an employee in BambooHR when using Payroll, you will need to identify the employee's final pay date. The system will then calculate deduction end dates by using the following rules:

Active benefit and non-benefit deductions without an end date are set with an end date that matches the final pay date.
Active benefit and non-benefit deductions with an end date after the final pay date will change to match the final pay date.
Active benefit and non-benefit deductions with an end date before the final pay date will not change. These deductions will end naturally before the final pay date.

A message will appear below the Final Pay Date field to remind you of deduction end dates as they pertain to the final pay date.

As you enter a final pay date, consider the following cases:

If the deduction is ending after the final pay date, the final pay date will be the last deduction. Note that you may want to increase the deduction amount to cover missed paychecks.
If you adjust the final pay date, the date of the scheduled change for terminating benefit coverage will change to the new date. If you remove the final pay date, the system will also remove the date of the scheduled change.
If, based on the coverage termination date, the system calculates that a deduction should end prior to the final pay date, the deduction will not be included on the final pay date.
If you need to set an end date for an employee's deductions to end before the final pay date, the system will honor that date, and the default final pay date rules will no longer apply. You can do this manually on the employee's Pay Info or Benefits tab.

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