#PainlessBENEFITS

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PainlessBENEFITS: Self-Employment Benefits Made Easy

Having a system in place for managing your benefits and the financial obligations that come with being self-employed is a crucial part of building a stable career. That’s why we designed your Painless account to be the hub for all of these obligations. We’re continually focused on making it easier to manage these responsibilities from your Painless account and thanks to your help, coupled with a few of our own personal experiences, we’re stoked to announce a new extension to the Painless name. PainlessBENEFITS makes it easier than ever to create your own self-employment portable benefits package with our curated list of benefits providers as well as intuitive guides for linking those plans and policies to your Painless account. The preferred providers listed are not only the providers a majority of you already know and love, but are also the companies focused on catering to the needs of the self-employed workforce.

We’ve put together a quick summary to give you the rundown on each recommended platform and their offering:

MetLife

When it comes to providing your family with the financial protection they need for if the unthinkable happens – you need to find a provider you can trust. That’s exactly what MetLife is all about  – helping you navigate life’s twists and turns without dealing with the hassles you probably expect from a large financial services company. With MetLife’s Rapid Term life insurance, you can easily create the policy that fits your lifestyle.

Honest Dollar

With the leverage of parent company Goldman Sachs, Honest Dollar has quickly become the go-to provider for Individual Retirement Accounts. They’ve made comparing plans super easy so you don’t need the help of a financial advisor to know you’re choosing a plan that’s right for you. Once you’re set-up, making contributions is a breeze and you can easily schedule recurring deposits for a fully hands-off experience.

Stride Health

Stride Health was built for independent contractors and part-time employees and is solely focused on finding you the best coverage for the best price. Stride works with over 200 major carriers as well as hundreds of local insurance companies to guarantee that you’re getting the lowest price for a plan that covers your doctors and prescriptions. Finding coverage through Stride’s user friendly interface can be done and minutes, and the best part is that using the Stride Health platform is completely free!

For more information on each of these providers and their offerings, check them out on the new PainlessBENEFITS page.

We’re going to continue adding partners and integrations that make building your portable benefits package as easy as possible. For us, part of that process is being your go-to resource for all things self-employment benefits. If you’re looking for a benefit that’s not already listed on PainlessBENEFITS, leave us your email and a quick outline of what you need here. We’ll drop you a line with recommendations and any other necessary info.

[painless1099]

Why Automation is Essential to Any Freelance Career

Being a freelancer comes with a laundry list of business administrative duties. While you may have gotten into freelancing to focus on delivering your best work to clients, doing daily upkeep on your business can add a ton of extra pressure!

In order to build a successful career as a freelancer, you’ll need to create systems to be able to manage all of these tasks as efficiently as possible. This means focusing on the work that you do best and outsourcing tedious tasks that require valuable time and attention. Luckily, new technology makes it super easy to automate a lot of the time consuming tasks that come with being a solopreneur. 

Managing the financial obligations that come with self-employment is an area where we as freelancers tend to get bogged down the most. Most of these responsibilities are things that the HR department would handle at a typical W-2 job – like tax withholding, setting up health insurance, and getting into some kind of retirement plan. It can be tricky to handle some of this stuff on your own. Luckily, companies like Honest Dollar and Freelancers Union have made it super easy for freelancers to find coverage and retirement plans that best fit their particular needs.

However, this is only half the battle. Making regular contributions to a retirement plan, covering monthly insurance premiums, and then remembering to set money aside for self-employment taxes can feel like a full time job all in itself. Throw in fluctuating income throughout the year and keeping up with your budget, juggling it all is, well, damn near impossible.

This leads to huge segments of the self-employed working without the benefits necessary to build a stable career. With 20% of freelancers completely uninsured and even more folks working without saving any money for retirement, it’s important to make sure you create a system that allows you to work with the coverage you need.

At Painless1099, we’ve found that automating the process of saving for and remitting payments for these financial obligations the best way to ensure that you stick to your budget. And we’re not alone! A recent white paper report released by Etsy shows that individuals are much more likely to save and fund their benefits when there is a system in place to allow them to “set it and forget it”.

Not only is this our motto at Painless1099, but we truly believe that this is the best way to manage your financial obligations and focus on the work that matters most. That’s why we’ve built a tool that automatically withholds a portion of your income for financial obligations.

In looking at which of these financial obligations is the most time consuming throughout the year, we realized saving for taxes is an on-going struggle for freelancers. With large portions of 1099 earners reporting spending upwards of 35 hours on taxes throughout the year, we decided to create a smart savings account that automatically withholds the percentage of your income that you need to save for taxes and transfers the rest – what’s safe to spend – directly to your personal checking account. It’s essentially the W-2 withholding but designed for your self-employment income.

Obviously taxes are only one piece of the puzzle. Being able to automate the process of saving for all of your financial obligations is where the true value is at. That’s why we recently launched PainlessBENEFITS. Now you can easily create your own self-employment portable benefits package and automate payments for all of your financial obligations. Once you have everything set up, you can go back to work without the stress of keeping up with a handful of due dates each month.

There’s nothing easy about being a freelancer, but the reward is well worth it. That’s why it’s so important to make sure you’re always working as efficiently and have the benefits in place to maintain a stable career.