Over 18 years at Fiduciary Decisions, our benchmarking reports were used as evidence in retirement plan fee litigation. In at least four cases, federal judges cited our methodology in written decisions. Our approach was tested under adversarial conditions, with opposing counsel challenging every assumption and competing experts offering alternative analyses, and it held up. That happened for one reason: independence.
Our benchmarking method is not customizable by the requestor. The comparison groups, the data sources, and the calculations are set by us, not by the employer, not by the provider, not by anyone with a financial interest in the outcome. That separation is what makes benchmarking benchmarking rather than reporting.
When a client asked us to adjust a comparison group to produce a more favorable result, the answer was no. When a provider challenged our data selection in litigation, we could show exactly why each choice was made, and that no choice had been made to favor either side. That is what judicial credibility looks like in practice.
The most common objection to applying retirement benchmarking discipline to health insurance is that healthcare is different. It is. The providers are different, the data structures are different, and health insurance is far less transparent today than retirement was when we built Fiduciary Decisions. Anyone who claims they can benchmark health insurance exactly the way retirement plans are benchmarked is not being straight with you.
What transfers is the method, not the data. Benchmarking in any industry requires four things: an independent entity that sets the methodology, comparison groups chosen without input from the requestor, data sources with no financial interest in the outcome, and calculations the client cannot adjust to produce a preferred result. Those four requirements do not change from one industry to the next. They are what separate a benchmark from a report.
HealthPlanIQ applies those same requirements to health insurance, built on all of what the industry currently makes available, and designed to expand as regulation and market pressure push providers toward greater transparency.
Your benchmark is only as credible as the independence of the entity that produced it. That was true in retirement and it is true in healthcare. Before you accept any benchmarking in this space, ask who set the methodology, and whether the answer was you.
Part of the Countdown to Change series.