Aug 14, 2023
Employee Navigator has received many requests from Ease brokers and licensees to begin using the Employee Navigator (EN) platform for the open enrollment season this fall. While most brokers will continue to add new customers to Ease and will plan to migrate existing customers to the EN platform next summer, Employee Navigator wants to accommodate brokers who would like to begin using the platform now.
The purpose of this communication is to inform you of the upcoming training schedule so you can make the necessary plans to attend and get a firsthand look at some basic highlights of the licensing program. Employee Navigator considers Ease licensees who choose to use the EN platform before the conversion tool and Carrier Forms are released to be Early Adopters.
Key Points for Early Adopters:
- There will be no additional licensing fee to access Employee Navigator’s platform. All Ease brokers who participate at this time will continue with their current Ease licensing package and pricing.
- Multiple users are welcome to attend the training as well as sublicensees of all brokers.
- Each broker will be required to sign a new EN license agreement for no license fee and will accept Employee Navigator’s standard terms and conditions.
- Brokers paying for an Ease subscription and an Employee Navigator subscription will continue the current payment schedules for both systems for the time being. Employee Navigator will announce a license conversion program in the fall.
- Employee Navigator has not completed the Teams invitation for General Agents. GAs may license EN and participate in the training to become familiar with EN, however, their deployment of EN may be limited for the time being.
All users will be required to attend an online or in-person training and complete the independent, self-paced lessons prior to these trainings. Additional training sessions will be added as needed, so you don't have to worry about missing out. Remote training is anticipated to take approximately 10 hours.
Online Training Dates and Times
- August 21–22: 11:30 AM ET – 2:00 PM ET and 3:00 PM ET – 5:30 PM ET REGISTER
- September 7–8: 11:30 AM ET – 2:00 PM ET and 3:00 PM ET – 5:30 PM ET REGISTER
In-Person Training Dates and Times
On site: 2-day training (9 classroom hours + optional 4-hour lab) REGISTER
August 28–29: In Frederick, MD (between Washington D.C. and Baltimore, MD)
- Day 1: 9:00 AM ET – 12:00 PM ET and 1:00 PM ET – 4:00 PM ET
- Day 2: 9:00 AM ET – 12:00 PM ET and *12:30 PM ET – 4:30 PM ET
In-person training is limited to 100 attendees. There is a $25 processing fee for each participant.
*Optional time available for individual coaching while building a group.
Employee Navigator has not begun adding Ease features to Employee Navigator’s platform, so some familiar features will not be available to Early Adopters until 2024. Therefore, they recommend the EN platform to be primarily used for new groups. Key features to be added to the EN platform include:
- Carrier Forms
- Teams invitations
- Change broker tools
Employee Navigator are continuing the feature gap analysis and plan to add Ease-based features beginning this fall with the majority of the key features scheduled to be in place by next summer. Some of these key features which will be added to the EN platform include:
- Carrier & HR forms
- Rate libraries (both GA and Integrated)
- Payroll classes and incomes
- Expanded integrated EOI
- Agency Management Systems API
- Elements of Ease’s better user interface
- General Agency & Enroller Support
- Company migration tool to move companies from Ease to EN
You can be confident in Employee Navigator’s infrastructure which currently supports 10+ million employees working at more than 75,000+ companies who are leveraging a robust set of integrations. Their primary challenge is going to be training. Ease has about 10,000 regular monthly broker users (EN has about 19,000) who have been gradually trained over 7 years. Employee Navigator currently trains about 20 agencies per month. Requiring new users to attend training sessions, and more importantly, completing the independent self-paced lessons in advance of the training is the only way they will be able to support such a large influx of new users.
Finally, Employee Navigator anticipates a significant number of questions from Ease users with this announcement. You can post your questions and view responses in their Knowledge Base. All updates to the training will also be posted in this article. An updated communication with licensing details and self-study materials will be sent out on Wednesday, August 16th.
You may also contact your Amwins Connect Sales Representative for more information.
