The intranet is a fine place for policies, org charts, and files that should stay inside the company. It is a poor place for the benefits facts a household needs on a Sunday. It requires a network, a login, and often a VPN. The spouse does not have those. A no-login mobile page holds the decision facts: deadlines, where to go, and phone numbers. It points to the portal when someone must enroll, change a contribution, or see a claim. Each tool keeps its job.
Eighty-six percent of employees say they are confused by their benefits. A login wall in front of the only plain-language page makes that worse. The distinction between storing information and delivering it is the point of portal versus communication platform. Fair access for the household is Reach Equity™. The person most likely to need the nurse line is often a dependent, which is why spouse and dependent communication starts with a page they can open.
What belongs on each surface
On the no-login mobile page: open enrollment dates, the support phone number, the nurse line, urgent care versus emergency guidance, how to find a digital ID card, and a short explanation of what is changing this year. Write it so it reads on a phone in one thumb-scroll per topic. Name the plan year. Name who the page is for, especially if entities differ.
On the intranet: internal HR procedures, manager-only briefing cards, draft documents, and links that only make sense on the network. If a manager needs a script, the intranet is a reasonable home for that script. The employee-facing facts still need a public mobile URL the manager can text.
On the portal: transactions. Elections, life-event changes, claim status, beneficiary forms, and anything that requires identity. The mobile page sends people there with one line: “To enroll or change a contribution, sign in to the portal.” Do not rebuild the portal on the open page. Do not hide the phone number inside the portal and call the open page done.
Test it the way a spouse will use it
Open the page on a personal phone, off VPN, off the office wifi, in a private browser. If it asks for a corporate login, it is still an intranet. If the text is a desktop PDF that does not zoom, it is still a document. If the phone number is an image, it is still hard to tap. Fix those before you announce the URL.
Have someone who is not in HR complete three tasks: find the enrollment deadline, call the nurse line, and describe where to get an ID card. Time them. If any task takes more than a minute, the page is organized for the team that built it. Move the three answers to the top. Land QR codes on that same top of the mobile page.
Check the page in the languages you support. A language toggle that sits behind the login helps no one at home. The multilingual guide covers review. At a minimum, the deadline and the phone number must be correct in each language you publish. A wrong number in a second language is worse than no translation.
How communication uses the page
Every monthly note, text, and push should land on a specific heading. “Card help” during January. “FSA deadline” in November. Deep links are the difference between a message and a scavenger hunt. The frontline guide shows why that link has to work from a personal phone on a break.
Email can still carry the longer note for people who read email. The link in the email goes to the mobile page. The intranet copy, if you keep one, points to the same URL so you are not maintaining two truths. When they conflict, the mobile page wins, because that is the one the household saw.
Put a human name and hours on the page. A form that emails a shared inbox with no stated response time will be ignored in a crisis. “Call Alex’s team, weekdays 8 to 5, at this number” is a decision fact. It belongs next to the carrier number, with a line about which one to use for a claim versus a payroll deduction.
What to measure
Measure task completion in the test, then measure real use: traffic from personal devices, clicks to the portal from the page, and tickets that start with “I could not find the number.” A fall in those tickets after you move the number to the open page is the result. Time-on-page is a weak headline. Someone who found the nurse line in twenty seconds did the job.
If leaders want a single place to judge whether the intranet-only habit is the problem, walk the employer scorecard with the household question in mind. Employers who need the open page staffed all year can see the approach on the employer overview. LinQed Online is built to be that no-login layer in the company’s brand, with the portal left in charge of transactions. More on the channel mix lives with the rest of the library.
Key takeaways
- The intranet assumes a network and a login a spouse does not have.
- The no-login mobile page holds deadlines, where to go, and phone numbers.
- The portal keeps transactions: enroll, change, claim, beneficiary.
- Test on a personal phone, off VPN, with three tasks a non-HR person can finish.
- Messages should deep-link to the heading for that month.
- When the intranet and the mobile page disagree, the mobile page is the one to fix first.
Frequently asked questions
What belongs on the no-login page?
Deadlines, nurse and member-service numbers, where to go for care, how to find an ID card, and a short note on what is changing. Anything a household must know before they can decide or get care tonight. Keep it readable on a phone without a zoom struggle.
What should stay on the intranet?
Manager scripts, internal procedures, and drafts. Employee decision facts need a URL that works off the network. You can link from the intranet to that URL. Do not make the intranet the only home for the phone number.
How do we test the page?
A personal phone, cellular data, no VPN, private browser. Ask someone outside HR to find the deadline, the nurse line, and the ID card steps. If any task needs a corporate login, the page is not no-login yet.
Where do elections and claims happen?
In the portal, after sign-in. The mobile page points there with one clear line. It does not try to complete the transaction itself, and it does not hide the support number behind that sign-in.
Put decision facts on a page a spouse can open. Test it on a personal phone, off VPN.
A co-founder of Touchpoints with two decades of experience in employee benefits communication. He partners hands-on with benefits firms and employers nationwide to build strategies that deliver real outcomes.
