We decide what your renewal should be before anyone is asked to quote.
Most renewals are judged against whatever the proposals happen to say. That makes the market the referee of its own game. We work the other way round: the renewal is taken apart first, a defensible number is built from its pieces, and every carrier response — including your incumbent’s — is then measured against that number rather than against each other.
Three questions come before any quote.
An increase arrives as one percentage. Underneath it are parts that move for different reasons, and only some of them were ever anyone’s to negotiate.
How Much Is Trend
The share that reflects what care costs everywhere this year. It is measured against published filed rates where they exist and against broad employer trend where they do not.
For a fully insured group under fifty, the state’s filed rate for your product type is the benchmark. Above fifty it is context, not the answer.
How Much Is Your Own Claims
How much weight your own experience carries depends on credibility, and credibility is driven by enrolled contracts, not headcount. Full credibility commonly takes around a thousand enrolled contracts; below that, the carrier’s book rate carries the balance.
The factor actually applied is printed on your rate exhibit. If you have never been shown it, that is the first question to ask.
How Much Is Who Joined and Left
Age, location and family mix shift every year. A renewal can rise with no change in the cost of covering anyone, simply because the census changed.
Separating that movement is what stops it being argued about as if it were trend.
The quiet inputs that move a renewal.
Most of the arguable money in a renewal sits in assumptions nobody on the employer side was asked to check.
The Census It Was Built On
Carriers price on the eligible and enrolled counts you supplied. If those counts change on submission, rates can change with them — so a wrong census is a wrong price, quietly.
A Claim That Is Not Coming Back
A large claim below the pooling point stays in your experience in full. If the person has recovered, left the plan or the treatment has ended, applying trend to it prices a cost that will not recur.
The Pooling Point Itself
Where the carrier caps a single claim’s effect decides how much of one bad year you carry. When pooling points rise, more of every large claim stays in your number.
Every proposal is then held to that number.
Once the number exists, the conversation changes. The question is no longer which quote is lowest, but which responses beat what the renewal should have been.
The Incumbent Sees It First
A renewal that exceeds the built number is challenged line by line with the carrier’s own figures before anyone else is invited in.
The Market Is Measured Against It
A proposal that undercuts the incumbent but misses the built number is not a saving. It is the same number with a new logo on it.
And You See the Whole Workings
Which parts moved, which parts were never movable, and which part was a pricing decision rather than a claims outcome. Nothing is summarized away.
Send us your renewal.
We’ll tell you whether it looks competitive, where we see opportunity, and the five questions we’d put to your carrier. No cost, and no obligation to move anything.
The renewal letter
Your current plan summary
Contribution split by tier
Enrolled counts by tier
Four documents — two more if your group is 50 or more. Nothing else; every extra one is a reason to postpone.
An independent employee benefits consulting firm. We look at the entire benefits program — cost, plan performance, risk and administration.
Cookies on This Site
We use cookies to keep the site working properly and to understand how it is used. You can decline anything that is not essential. See our Privacy Policy for the detail.
- Essential — needed for the site to load and for you to move around it. These cannot be switched off.
- Analytics — tell us which pages get read, so we know what is worth writing more of.
- Advertising — set by third parties such as ad and social platforms to measure and target campaigns.