ICHRA & benefits design
Marco is paying too much for a plan nobody likes
What happens when you stop picking one plan for everyone.
Marco runs a small company.
He picks one health plan for everyone — same carrier, same network. Ava is 29 and rarely sees a doctor. Jean is 61 and managing a heart condition. They’re on the same plan. Neither is well-served.
Five employees — Ava, Mark, Nina, Sam, and Jean — are grouped inside a single box labelled “one plan for everyone”, each showing the plan they have been placed on.
One plan for everyone
Same carrier · same network
Then the renewal letter arrives. Up 14%.
Marco’s options: absorb the cost, pass it to his employees, or switch carriers and disrupt everyone’s doctors. He does this every year.
The same box of five employees, now outlined in red and flagged “renewal +14%”, with the monthly cost rising from $8,200 to $9,350.
Renewal +14%
$8,200 → $9,350/mo
What if Marco stopped picking a plan altogether?
With ICHRA — an Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangement — he sets a monthly budget. Each employee shops the individual market for what fits their life.
The shared box is gone. Marco sets a monthly budget, and the five employees are free to shop the individual market separately.
Marco sets the budget
Ava picks a cheap bronze. Jean gets the gold PPO she needs.
Marco’s cost is exactly what he budgeted. No renewal surprises. If premiums rise, employees adjust their plan — not his bottom line.
Each of the five employees now sits in a card of their own, holding the plan they picked rather than the plan they were given.