Check a census file before it breaks onboarding.
Drop in an employer's census and see every problem a benefits system would trip over: missing or repeated employee IDs, dates that could mean two things, ZIP codes Excel quietly broke. In seconds, with the row numbers to fix.
Drop a census CSV here
CSV files. Excel files: save as CSV UTF-8 first.
Your file never leaves this page. Your browser reads it and the check runs right here: nothing is uploaded, and the page is locked so it can't send your file anywhere. Salaries and Social Security numbers are never shown in the results. We only count that a check ran and how many problems it found.
The problems that make a census bounce, or worse, load wrong.
- Employee IDsMissing, repeated, turned into scientific notation, or shortened when Excel dropped the leading zeros.
- Dates that could mean two things03/04/2020 is 3 April or March 4. We tell you which way the file reads, or that nobody can tell.
- Dates that can't be right31 February, Excel day-counts like 43831, two-digit years, birthdays in the future, people hired before age 14.
- ZIP codesThe Northeast's 0-first ZIP codes that Excel turned into four digits.
- The file itselfRows that don't line up, a missing header row, duplicate column names, blank rows, and old encodings that garble accented names.
- Values that disagree"M" and "Male" in the same column, "Sales" and "sales ", placeholders like N/A and Excel's #N/A.
- EmailsInvalid addresses, and the same address used for two people.
- Sensitive columnsFlags Social Security numbers so the file is sent securely, without ever showing them.
Before you drop a file in
Is my census file uploaded anywhere?
No. Your browser reads the file on this page and the check runs there. Nothing is uploaded, and the page is locked so that it can't send your file anywhere. You can disconnect from the internet after the page loads and it still works. To know the tool is useful, we count that a check ran, and how many people and problems it found: never names, values or anything else from the file.
My census is an Excel file. Can I check it?
Save it as CSV first: in Excel choose File › Save As › CSV UTF-8. Checking the CSV is also more honest, because that's the file a benefits system actually receives, including anything Excel changed on the way out.
What's a census file?
The list of an employer's employees that a benefits platform, carrier or broker needs to set up and price coverage: usually one row per employee with an ID, name, date of birth, hire date and ZIP code, often salary and coverage tier too.
Every employer sends a different file. What then?
That's what Shapewire does for benefits platforms: we match each employer's columns once, check every file like this before anything is loaded, and deliver it into your system, with anything that doesn't fit held back with the exact reason. Talk to us.