Taking Care of Chimers: Our approach to benefits and rewards at Chime

“No matter what stage of life someone is in — fresh out of college and getting off their parents’ insurance, starting a family, preparing to transition, or approaching retirement — benefits matter because we all have a basic need to take care of our health and wellbeing,” explains Kristen Jordan, Chime’s Benefits & Wellness Manager.

Health and wellness benefits are a huge relief financially, too. Without health insurance, looking after our well-being can become expensive. “Offering those resources to employees provides peace of mind and helps people feel present at work instead of stressed about paying for healthcare bills,” Kristen adds.

Our benefits philosophy

At Chime, we take a holistic approach to our benefits, always addressing four components when we evaluate, add, or remove a benefit:

• Physical
• Social
• Mental
• Financial

“When we keep these components in mind, we can ensure that every benefit we offer fits into one or more of the categories and helps Chimers achieve health and wellness across their lives,” says Kristen. As Kristen and the Benefits & Wellness team craft Chime’s offering, they always lead with empathy, reflecting on what people need, where they are in their lives — and meeting them whenever possible.

“Our Goal is that every Chimer can find what they need in our suite of benefits, even if they don’t need every one,” Kristen explains. “In fact, we offer so many benefits that many Chimers won’t need to access them at all times and stages of their career here.” For example, a Chimer could be well into their career with grown children and not need our fertility benefit — but we offer other benefit programs, such as Origin Financial, that might offer Chimers retirement strategies to help them plan for the future. Our Benefits & Wellness program is very comprehensive and really aims to meet Chimers where they are.

Kristen and the team are intentional in their approach to ensure we’re offering the things Chimers need. They use data to understand who they’re serving — their ages, life stages, needs, and interests — so they can identify trends as they emerge within the organization and narrow down what people really need. And when it comes to measuring the success and impact of Chime’s benefits program, Kristen and her team look at the utilization of benefits, Chimers’ curiosity, and feedback.

The team relies on employee surveys, usage metrics, and anecdotal feedback from Chimers over Slack to get program inputs. They make sure they’re sharing benefits updates with Chimers through a monthly newsletter. “Feedback is great, but not when it’s due to a lack of knowledge — our newsletter helps educate Chimers so we can focus on improving their benefits experience instead of just telling them what’s available.”

“Our current program speaks to our desire to care for Chimers and their families — I believe it’s very well-rounded and offers a ton of resources and tools to help every Chimer feel healthy and supported,” Kristen adds.

Always evolving our benefits offerings

As Kristen and the team review metrics and feedback, they’re always looking for ways to evolve our benefits offerings. “We heard from Chimers that they wanted gym memberships and other wellness-focused benefits,” she says. “So we implemented Navigate Wellbeing, a wellness tool that helps Chimers obtain complete wellness by tapping into the physical, mental, social, and financial aspects of wellbeing.”

Over time, as Chime has grown, the use of some benefits has fluctuated — leading Kristen and the team to adjust accordingly. “At one point, we offered a legal benefit to all Chimers, and it was really popular,” Kristen says. “As we grew, fewer and fewer people used it, so we revised the benefit to be available to those who sign up for it rather than all Chimers. We strive to continue adjusting our program to ensure Chimers utilize benefits to their full capacity. Just because a benefit isn’t used doesn’t mean our program isn’t successful — it’s a signal that we should change our offering.”

Making such changes to the benefits offered helps Kristen and the team know they’re offering the things Chimers really need and will use. She and the team have also made additions to help Chimers get the most out of their benefits, such as Collective Health, which brings all healthcare benefits under one roof by helping Chimers manage their health from the palm of their hands. “For me, adding Collective Health was about bringing a sense of ease to Chimers when they need to find healthcare-related information,” Kristen says. “With the app, they can just pick up their phones and get their ID cards, find a physician, or learn more about a specific procedure.”

Another change Kristen and the team introduced this year includes enhancing our mental health offering. Modern Health is now part of our overall health plan, and, in response to the overwhelming use of our therapy sessions benefit, their continued mental healthcare will be covered through our medical plan. “Before, we offered 12 free therapy sessions per year, but we noticed that Chimers were using them quickly,” Kristen explains. “Now they can continue their therapy beyond those 12 sessions and know they’ll be covered.”

Meeting Chimers where they are with benefits

This year, Kristen and the team have spent a lot of time rethinking benefits that have emerged as important to Chimers right now, like parental leave policies and mental health. Based on Chimers' feedback, they’re improving the leave experience by adjusting the length of leaves and the return to work process. “We want to make sure that Chimers feel supported, our health plan is functioning as it should, and that we’re staying within or going beyond industry standards,” Kristen says.

As the world of work continues to change from remote to hybrid and in-office, Kristen and the team are also thinking about the changes that will come to Chime’s benefits and wellness offerings. “Before the pandemic, we often had tangible in-office benefits, like health fairs or on-site screenings, so we’re exploring things like that for the year ahead,” she says. “We’re seeing companies start to spend more time in the office, which makes it even more critical for benefits teams to expand their offerings so that employees feel that going into the office is worth their while.”