Employee benefits seem to satisfy workers, but gaps persist

While workers have reported higher well-being since 2019, WTW found financial concerns are straining workers’ access to medical care.

By: Caroline Colvin • Published Oct. 15, 2026

Workers’ overall well-being has improved, according to data analysis by WTW, with 64% of employees saying they’re physically thriving. This is up 10% since 2019.

Improvements in how employees understand and access their benefits may be contributing to the rise in well-being. Still, while WTW notes that benefits offerings and worker well-being have improved overall, employees are not accessing care as they should, with 41% of people in their 40s and 21% of employees 60 and older delaying or skipping their doctor’s appointments due to financial issues.

“Financial pressure is now shaping whether employees seek care, how confident they feel about retirement and how well they perform at work,” WTW noted in its press statement. “For employers, the response lies in program design: making coverage affordable and building resilience for employees under financial strain.”

As is the case every open enrollment season, many benefits and workplace experts are chiming in with advice and best practices for people operations professionals guiding workers through benefits elections.

Tracy Watts, senior partner and U.S. leader for healthcare policy at Marsh, recently spoke in an HR Dive live event about the cost-of-living crisis and how HR can fill in the gaps. Watts previously shared advice for how HR can present benefit offerings to their employees, emphasizing that personal ownership over benefits is key during open enrollment.

Additionally, Watts offered HR-specific advice for open enrollment in three tenets: Address the employer costs early, address the affordability crisis for employees, and enable better access to care.

To address the costs on the employee side, Watts emphasized that people are looking for an easier way to pay or afford medical bills. So, for example, employers can look into co-pay plans that offer consolidated billing with the option to pay over time. “Consolidated billing and payment plans are a great way to avoid or ease the financial burden, and stress, of medical debt,” Watts said.

To tackle drivers of healthcare plan costs from an employer standpoint, Watts suggested HR professionals assess risk tolerance for certain high-cost claims, see where vendors can increase value in their offerings and ensure practices are up to industry standards.

Article top image credit: Spencer Platt via Getty Images