Segal Company

Vendor Competitive Bidding and Renewal Negotiations

Competitive Bidding

Segal conducts hundreds of competitive procurements every year to help our public sector clients select vendors for all types of benefit programs. Each of these bid processes involves surveying the available plans in the market place, comparing the benefit coverages offered by each plan and establishing relative values among the benefits, analyzing the cost of plans, and negotiating with carriers to obtain the best rates available for our clients. 

Segal is available to assist public sector entities through the entire procurement process as needed, including:

  • Identifying key evaluation points and developing evaluation documents for use by the source selection committee
  • Developing a proposed plan design that takes into account current "best practices" among other key jurisdictions and other employers
  • Preparing a detailed set of technical questions and financial elements for the request for proposal (RFP)
  • Identifying vendors that should be included in the list of potential benefit providers as part of the bid solicitation process
  • Preparing for and conducting the pre-bid conference for each procurement process, as well as serving as a technical resource at the pre-bid meeting and helping to interpret the nature of each question from vendors and prepare answers
  • Meeting with the selection committee to discuss issues related to the evaluation of the bid and to prepare them for the likely range of responses they may see on key criteria
  • Reviewing and evaluating the technical and financial proposals
  • Reviewing program administrators' service agreements and proposals, and determining administrators' ability to deliver quality service
  • Conducting interviews of the finalist carriers
  • Assisting in any final negotiations regarding services to be provided, including analysis of Best and Final Offers
  • Preparing and presenting any required reports to the various legislative and administrative bodies that oversee the procurement process
  • Reviewing contracts and other documents required to implement the changes to the benefit program
  • Monitoring the vendor's progress toward implementation

Renewals

Segal has an experienced staff of analysts who review renewals.  Our reviews include a verification of source numbers and an in-depth underwriting analysis that evaluates the level of charges for trend inflation, retention, pooling and any applicable margins.

As part of our annual work on health and benefit plan renewals, we provide a summary of how your plans compare to others in the market and the prevailing trends and best practices in the industry. Segal develops and utilizes cost models for benefit programs that allow us to test the likely impact of industry trends in plan design. Once we have analyzed the current and projected costs of the existing program, we can provide close estimates of proposed changes.