You don't need to slash coverage to reduce costs. The most effective cost-reduction strategies preserve — and often improve — employee benefits while eliminating the waste, inefficiency, and opacity that inflate premiums year after year. Here are ten places to start.
1–3: Plan Design Adjustments
- 1. Shift to a High-Deductible Health Plan (HDHP) paired with robust HSA funding — employees share risk while you reduce premiums
- 2. Add a tiered network option that rewards employees for choosing high-value providers
- 3. Implement a spousal surcharge for spouses who have access to coverage elsewhere
4–6: Alternative Funding Strategies
- 4. Explore level-funding or partial self-funding to access your claims data and reduce carrier margin
- 5. Carve out your pharmacy benefit to an independent PBM for transparent pricing
- 6. Add reference-based pricing for facility claims to replace inflated chargemaster rates
7–9: Vendor & Administrative Savings
- 7. Conduct a dependent eligibility audit — 3 to 8% of covered dependents are often ineligible
- 8. Benchmark and renegotiate stop-loss premiums and attachment points annually
- 9. Audit carrier administrative fees and TPA contracts for hidden markups
10: Preventive Care Investment
10. Invest in direct primary care (DPC) access to reduce emergency room utilization and catch conditions early. Employers who add a DPC layer consistently report lower total claims costs within 12–24 months. Prevention is the best cost-containment strategy available.
Where to Start
Not all ten strategies are right for every employer. Remedy Advisors analyzes your claims data, workforce demographics, and current plan structure to identify which levers will deliver the greatest impact for your specific situation — starting with your data, not a carrier proposal.