"Show me the incentive and I will show you the outcome."
Employee benefits analysis · Nashville, TN
Your broker is paid by the carriers he recommends.
I review underwriting, renewals, and vendor decisions for employers and brokers, and deliver a written report on what the numbers actually support.
Your broker's incentive is a commission from the carrier. Mine is an hourly fee from you — no commissions, no carrier overrides, no placement revenue. When the incentive is to get the numbers right instead of getting a deal closed, you get an outcome you can trust.
Path A
I'm an employer
You have a renewal, an RFP, or a broker relationship you would like tested by someone with nothing to sell you. I read the underwriting and tell you what it says.
For employers
Path B
I'm a broker
Your producers should be in front of clients, not rebuilding renewal models. I do the underwriting and the exhibits, white label, under your name.
For brokers
The problem is structural, not personal
Most benefits advice reaches an employer through someone who is compensated by the carriers being recommended. That arrangement is legal, disclosed, and completely ordinary. It is also the reason nobody in the room is working only for you.
Renewals do not arrive as raw data. They arrive pre-interpreted: a rate, a trend assumption, a narrative about why the increase is reasonable, and a recommended response. The interpretation is usually competent. It is rarely independent.
The person receiving that package is typically an HR director or a benefits manager who owns the plan but has no underwriting background — and no realistic way to test whether the trend assumption, the credibility weighting, or the pooling charge is defensible. So the number gets accepted, and it becomes the base for next year's number.
My work is to sit on the other side of that. I read the same file the carrier and the broker are reading, and I write down what it supports and what it does not.
What gets examined
There are no case studies on this site — prior work belongs to a former employer. What I can show you is exactly what a review covers.
- Renewal rate development
- How the carrier arrived at the number, line by line.
- Trend assumptions
- Whether the assumed medical and Rx trend is supported by your own experience.
- Credibility weighting
- How much of the rate is your claims and how much is the carrier's book.
- Stop-loss placement
- Contract basis, laser history, and whether the market was actually tested.
- IBNR and reserves
- Whether the reserve estimate is adequate, conservative, or quietly padded.
- PBM contract terms
- Definitions, rebate flow, spread, and where the guarantees have gaps.
- Network discount claims
- What the reported discount measures, and against which charge base.
- Admin and PEPM fees
- Every fee in the stack, including the ones bundled into other line items.
- Plan design alternatives
- Modeled against your claims experience, not against illustrative averages.
- Vendor RFP scoring
- Weighted criteria applied consistently across every responding vendor.
When people call
Double-digit renewal
The increase arrived with an explanation attached. You want to know whether the explanation holds up before you accept it.
New leader, inherited plan
You did not build this program and cannot yet vouch for it. A baseline read tells you what you have taken on.
Acquisition or divestiture
Two plans have to become one, or one has to become two. The financial consequences run for years.
Sustained turnover
Enrollment and risk mix have shifted underneath the rating. The renewal may be priced for a population you no longer have.
An unexamined relationship
The broker has been in place a long time and nobody has independently tested the work. That is not an accusation, it is a gap.
Evaluating self-funding
You are weighing a move from fully insured to self-funded, or back the other way. The decision turns on claims volatility, stop-loss terms, and cash-flow exposure, not on the projected savings alone.
What I am not
- Not your broker of record.
- Properly licensed, but not functioning as a broker or placing coverage for you.
- Not paid by any carrier, TPA, PBM, or vendor.
- Not handling enrollment, paperwork, or implementation with the insurer.
That independence is the product. The moment I take a commission, my read on your renewal is worth less to you.
Next
Bring me the renewal file
Twenty minutes is enough to tell whether there is something here worth examining.