Building benefits

Clark & Associates, an independent insurance firm in Nevada, has partnered with the Nevada Builders Alliance to provide its members with cost-effective employee benefits and human resources services.

The partnership provides large group benefit plans to building companies of all sizes, allowing these companies to be more attractive to potential employees.

“What we are offering is deeply discounted rates to the members of the alliance,” Valerie Clark, president of Clark & Associates, said. “We felt that they were a perfect fit to the solutions that we could bring to the table in terms of managing benefits and human resources.”

Nevada Builders Alliance is a professional organization for the construction industry. The organization was established in 1966 and is headquartered in Carson City.

“With more than 700 members representing tens of thousands of workers in every corner of Nevada, Nevada Builders Alliance can rely on this agreement with Clark & Associates to assist our members as they build strong workforces,” Aaron West, CEO of Nevada Builders Alliance, said in a press release. “This is a valuable benefit to all of our members.”

The building industry is coming out of a time period where the recession hit them pretty heavily, Clark explained. Now that the industry is reviving, companies are competing to attract and retain skilled workers. This makes it harder for smaller building companies who can’t afford the types of benefits and resources that larger companies offer.

“We want to take that off their shoulders, we want them to do what they do best which is go out there and build and make Nevada beautiful and strong again,” Clark said. “We are going to be behind them supporting them with good insurance, good benefit plans (and) good human resource services to take care of their employees.”

The benefit package offered through the partnership includes five health insurance options, including a Health Savings Account, dental and vision coverage and a 401(k) program. Clark & Associates is also offering a wide array of human resources services through their company Solutions at Work such as payroll services, employee handbooks, job descriptions, management of unemployment insurance claims and more.

“We can support whatever they already have and support anything they don’t,” Clark said.

Clark & Associates developed the partnership over the past six months and they have already started providing benefits and human resources services to companies within the alliance.

“We have meet some great people who are members (of Nevada Builders Alliance) and we are getting some great reactions,” Clark said.

This is not the first time the insurance company has partnered with other associations in Nevada. They work closely with the Nevada Manufacturers Association, Associated General Contractors, medical societies around the state of Nevada and many non-profits. However, as the result of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) regulation the partnerships they had in place were deemed illegal. Clark & Associates had to recreate a different package that would work with the regulations. The partnership with Nevada Builders Alliance is the first of the new partnerships.

According to Clark, after Affordable Care Act passed in 2010 and started to be implemented over the past six years they recognized a need to create these types of partnerships throughout various industries.

“Right now with the way our economy is starting to grow, everyone is fighting for employees,” Clark said. “The ability to be able to have these services as a small employer makes it that much easier to survive and grow.”

Clark said insurance companies know when unemployment is high because companies drop or lessen their benefits since they do not need extra incentives to attract employees. Now that the economy has rebounded, companies are increasing their benefits.

“People who didn’t have benefit plans now want them, people who just had medical insurance for their employees now want dental, vision and disabilities benefits as well because those are the things that attract people to your company,” Clark said.

Clark & Associates, headquartered in Reno, has been providing insurance and benefits for 24 years and human resources services through the Solutions at Work since 2010. They also offer business insurance through their company Altus Insurance Group. The company has 11 employees and provides services throughout Nevada and the sounding regions.

Companies who are part of the Nevada Builders Alliance and are interested in learning more about Clark & Associates’ services can contact Sarah Sommers at sarah@mysolutionsatwork.com, Melissa Davies at melissa@clarkandassoc.com or call 775-828-7420.