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Commercial payments

June 24, 2026

 

Benefits, rebooted: How payment tech could transform workplace rewards

Mastercard and Mercer Marsh explore how making benefits more accessible through digital delivery can improve resilience, reduce friction and drive value.

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Dianna Delling

Contributor

In today’s competitive job market, benefits like health insurance and spending allowances can be the linchpin to snagging a valuable hire, not to mention retaining long-term employees.

According to the 2026 Global Talent Trends report from Marsh, a global leader in risk, insurance and consulting, 68% of employees globally said they would trade a 10% raise for higher quality medical care and coverage. More than half would forgo the extra pay for additional well-being benefits.

Yet boosting benefits can be complex for many companies. Legacy benefits administration gobbles up time and resources, and trying to offer a full suite of benefits can make it even more challenging.

“Benefits plan sponsors are seeking simplification and control at a time when managing benefits is ever more complex,” says Hervé Balzano, president of Health and Benefits and Mercer Marsh Benefits’ global leader. “Costs are rising, regulations are constantly shifting, there are growing expectations of transparency, and the multifaceted and multigenerational workforce presents a wide variety of needs. HR and risk teams are being asked to deliver more and more, with less margin for error.”

 

Digitization: The foundation of modern benefits ecosystems

Today, just 38% of organizations report having a highly effective digital-first benefits administration program.

Workforce benefits no longer operate as standalone programs, but as interconnected ecosystems spanning employers, employees, insurers, third-party administrators, niche vendors and payment networks, where seamless data and financial flows are critical to delivering real value.

Many HR teams rely on outdated platforms that make it hard to keep up with employee expectations. Adding to the challenge, benefits administrators must manage a complex web of insurers, benefit providers and third-party administrators, each with different ways of organizing and sharing data. Processes too often rely on manual entry and outdated payment methods, leading to errors, delays and frustration, not to mention increased cyber exposure.

According to Balzano, on the surface, employee benefits can seem appealing, but when they require out-of-pocket expenses, manual forms and lengthy approval processes — leaving employees financially exposed — the value they promise is diminished.

Digitization has a significant role to play in redefining how benefits are delivered, accessed and experienced, says Eimear Creaven, president, Global Partnerships at Mastercard. “Without a digitally connected ecosystem, even the most generous benefits will struggle to reach their full impact,” she said.

 

It’s time benefits reflected the same speed, intelligence and convenience that digital payments deliver across our everyday lives and experiences.

Eimear Creaven
Eimear Creaven

 

Digital tools can automate processes like enrollment, billing and vendor reconciliation with speed and accuracy. More importantly, they enable real-time access, transparency, and personalization — shifting benefits from periodic transactions to continuous, user-centric experiences.

“Bringing real-time simplicity into employee benefits is not just an operational improvement — it’s a strategic lever for engagement. When organizations remove friction and deliver value instantly, they build stronger, more loyal workforces,” Creaven says. “It’s time benefits reflected the same speed, intelligence and convenience that digital payments deliver across our everyday lives and experiences.”

 

Reimagining workforce benefits via intelligence, connectivity

As digitization matures, the convergence of data, artificial intelligence and payments infrastructure is reshaping how organizations design and deliver benefits strategies.

AI-driven insights are rapidly becoming central to benefits decision-making, enabling employers to move from static program design to dynamic optimization based on real-world usage and outcomes.

 

The future of benefits lies in actionable insight, where organizations can continuously evolve their offerings based on how employees actually engage.

Hervé Balzano
Hervé Balzano

 

Balzano imagines a world where AI-assisted analytics provide employers with real-time visibility into benefit usage across markets — delivering a clear, data-driven view of cost, value and employee engagement. This would enable organizations to continuously refine and personalize benefits, aligning investments more closely with workforce needs while improving both efficiency and impact, he says.

"The future of benefits lies in actionable insight, where organizations can continuously evolve their offerings based on how employees actually engage, rather than relying on assumptions," Balzano says. 

The newest digital workforce benefit platforms already offer advanced, AI-enabled features that can ease the administrative burden. Organizations are implementing systems like Darwin, Marsh’s cloud-based employee benefits platform, which allows HR teams, providers and employees to access real-time eligibility, billing and claims information 24/7.  

At the same time, digitized payment capabilities are enabling benefits to move from reimbursement-based models to more immediate, embedded experiences, reducing friction for users. “Payments are no longer viewed as the final step in the process — they are an integral part of how benefits are experienced and a strategic level for organizations. Modernizing this layer has the potential to unlock speed, transparency and trust across the entire ecosystem,” Creaven says.

Advanced benefits technologies have become essential for global companies managing programs that differ widely by geography. For example, commuting costs are standard benefits in parts of Europe, while outpatient care allowances are sometimes offered in Asia.

Digitization enables these diverse offerings to be managed through a unified infrastructure, creating consistency for employers and simplicity for employees, regardless of location. It also has the potential to democratize corporate benefits. Small businesses, often constrained by limited HR capacity, can leverage scalable digital platforms to offer competitive, personalized lifestyle spending allowances.

 

From process to experience: Enhancing the employee journey

The latest payment innovations could go a long way in modernizing the benefits experience for employees. The most effective benefits are no longer experienced as administrative processes, but as seamless, embedded moments within everyday life.

Virtual cards have transformed other industries, removing delays between paying and being reimbursed while increasing visibility and control. Applied to workforce benefits, they could enable real-time access to funds, reduce out-of-pocket burden, and increase transparency across the entire payment flow. Employees who can personalize their benefits are three times more likely to say their benefits meet their needs, so virtual cards and spending accounts can be important vehicles for personalization.

With the right technology in place, the experience becomes fully integrated, from benefit discovery to receipt capture via smartphone to automated policy checks, approvals and reconciliation — all underpinned by digitized payment rails that enable near real-time point-of-sale access to workforce benefits.

 

Unlocking the future of equitable, scalable benefits

According to Marsh’s 2026 People Risks report, 30% of risk and HR professionals are concerned about employee frustration and poor employee experience. Health and well-being of the workforce are key not only to strengthening the employee experience, but also foundational to business resilience, productivity and innovation.

The opportunity ahead lies in harnessing digital infrastructure to transform benefits from fragmented, resource-intensive programs into scalable, insight-driven ecosystems.

“Digitization is the unlock — enabling organizations to deliver more equitable access, improve efficiency and create more meaningful employee experiences at scale,” Creaven says. “Ultimately, the future of workforce benefits will be defined not just by what organizations offer — but by how seamlessly, intelligently, and equitably those benefits are delivered.”

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