To Bundle or Not To Bundle: The Brokers Dilemma

Shakespeare posed a question that has endured for centuries: to be, or not to be. For benefits brokers today, a similarly weighty question shapes how they structure client relationships and manage their book of business: to bundle voluntary benefits, or not to bundle. 

Bundling seems like it has become the default for many brokers, driven by the appeal of simplicity, a single bill, a single file feed, and a single point of contact. Inherently, there’s nothing wrong with that. But defaulting to any strategy without examining whether it truly serves your clients’ needs is where brokers can lose their edge. The most successful brokers aren't the ones who always bundle or always separate voluntary benefits. They're the ones willing to adapt. 

What's Happening in the Market 

Walk through any broker's book of business today and you'll find a familiar pattern. There's the medical carrier. There's the life and disability carrier. Dental and vision might be bundled with either of those carriers. And then there's the voluntary/supplemental health carrier. That's three carriers — not five, not ten. The assumption that adding a dedicated voluntary benefits carrier creates an administrative nightmare for HR teams is worth examining.  

In reality, when you use the right carrier partner and the right technology, the “lift” is actually pretty minimal. When you examine it through the lens of Trustmark, platforms like Enroll for Life can streamline the enrollment experience in ways that reduce the complexity for HR, even when an additional carrier is in the mix. The administrative burden argument carries less weight when you're working with a partner that makes the process efficient. 

Pros and Cons of Bundling vs. Not Bundling 

Yes, bundling has some advantages, but there are genuine advantages to not bundling as well. For smaller brokerage teams managing multiple accounts, bundling to consolidate carriers can reduce the number of relationships you have to manage, renewal dates to track, and systems to navigate. This is only meaningful when the carrier and product mix are right. It can also create a more seamless experience for HR and employees alike. 

On the flip side, when voluntary benefits are not bundled, they have the flexibility to run on their own renewal cycle, which can help HR teams avoid the all-at-once pressure of renewing multiple lines simultaneously.  

Additionally, if your client's enrollment strategy requires an external enrollment platform or firm, bundled commission structures may not generate the revenue needed to fund that approach. Unbundling can open funding flexibility that bundling forecloses. 

Neither path is inherently right or wrong. Each customer has different needs, different HR capacity, and different employee populations. Your strategy should follow the situation. 

ERISA Considerations 

One emerging factor that brokers and HR leaders are paying closer attention to is the growing body of ERISA-related litigation around supplemental health products. These cases haven't reached a tipping point yet, but they're raising important questions about plan classification and compliance exposure. 

Bundling voluntary benefits with major medical or other ERISA-covered coverage can blur the lines on whether the supplemental plans themselves fall under ERISA. Keeping voluntary benefits on a separate platform and enrollment cycle can support the classification of those products as excepted benefits outside of ERISA's scope. For clients with compliance-conscious HR or legal teams, that distinction matters, and it's a conversation worth having. 

Traditional Carriers vs. Trusted Advisors 

There's a meaningful difference between a carrier that wants to win every case and one that wants to win the right cases. The best carrier sales reps understand that distinction. 

When I was on the broker side of the business, I worked with a carrier representative who occasionally surprised me by telling me when a case wasn’t right for him. He wasn't focused on closing every deal. Instead, he was focused on doing what was right for me as the broker and my customer. That honesty earned my trust and strengthened our relationship. What started as a typical carrier-broker interaction grew into a true advisory partnership, where I relied on him as a trusted resource rather than just another vendor. 

You should expect the same from your carrier partners. The right ones won't pressure you to bundle or separate. They'll help you think through what makes sense for the client in front of you and give you an honest read on whether the fit is there. That's the standard worth holding your partners to. 

… 

To bundle or not to bundle? That is still the question. While there may never be a universally right answer, there is a wrong one: refusing to thoughtfully consider the question at all. Trusted advisors don’t begin with a solution they want to sell. They begin with questions they need to answer. The goal is not to prove that bundling or unbundling is the better approach. The goal is to determine what is right for the client. Asking that question will never be wrong.