The Next Benefits Technology Challenge: Removing the Friction

• October 19, 2026

By Keith Feist

For years, the benefits industry’s technology conversation focused largely on access: Can employees enroll digitally? And can carriers connect to an employer’s benefits administration platform?

But now, those questions are largely table stakes. The next challenge is removing the remaining friction—for employees, employers and the brokers who serve them.

COVID-19 accelerated a shift already underway. As employees became accustomed to digital, self-service experiences in other areas of their lives, they began expecting benefits enrollment to work the same way: simple, connected and intuitive.

Employers’ expectations changed, too. They needed smoother data management and more reliable connections among benefits administration platforms, carriers and other partners.

The Cost of Benefits Friction

Consider an employee who navigates multiple systems to enroll in benefits. Each additional step creates another opportunity for confusion or abandonment. Technology should make choosing and enrolling in coverage easier, not harder.

Employers experience a different kind of friction. Adding a benefit can mean additional setup, data feeds, troubleshooting and administrative work for an already busy HR team. A single inaccurate enrollment can take hours to reconcile billing, adjust payroll and recover from a negative employee experience.

For brokers, recommending the right benefit is only part of the equation. Employers need confidence that the carrier and enrollment platform will work together seamlessly. From billing and enrollment to new-hire onboarding and benefit changes throughout the year, every touchpoint matters. If the technology and processes aren’t aligned, even a valuable benefit offering can create friction for employers.

There’s another consideration as benefits technology evolves: Protection shouldn’t have to be sacrificed to make the product fit the technology.  

Historically, products sometimes needed to be simplified to work within enrollment systems. But employers and employees shouldn’t have to choose between a streamlined enrollment experience and robust benefits.

Instead, technology needs to accommodate the product, including the features that make coverage valuable. That requires deeper connectivity between carriers and benefits administration platforms, as well as better data synchronization.

The same principle applies to processes such as evidence of insurability. The more decisions and enrollment updates can happen in real time, the less waiting and paperwork employees encounter.

Make Complexity Invisible

Employees may never know how their benefits platform connects with a carrier. And they shouldn’t have to. Ultimately, the best benefits technology is barely noticeable. Employees should simply be able to understand their options, make a decision and enroll.

Brokers and employers feel the difference when those connections work well—and especially when they don’t. Repeatable connections between carriers and benefits administration platforms can reduce custom work, create more predictable implementation timelines and simplify the process of getting a new case up and running.

For brokers, the question is no longer simply whether a carrier can connect to a particular platform. It’s how well those connections work and what kind of experience they create.Keith Feist is the executive director of sales technology and partner relations at Trustmark.