Employee Benefits Consultant

An employee benefits consultant provides comprehensive advisory services to larger employers on plan design, vendor selection, and regulatory compliance. Consultants are often based at large national advisory firms such as Mercer, Aon, Willis Towers Watson, Gallagher, and Lockton. Unlike a broker, a consultant more often works on a fee basis, though the CAA requires full compensation disclosure regardless of structure.

Consultants sit at the center of the GLP-1 and specialty drug cost conversation. Mercer and Business Group on Health have both identified it as the top employer benefits issue heading into 2026, with pharmacy costs now accounting for nearly 29.5% of total benefit costs. Total consultant compensation runs roughly 2–7% of total premium for a typical account, per Kaiser Family Foundation's 2025 Employer Health Benefits Survey.

That cost pressure is exactly where a consultant's recommendation needs to hold up under CAA-defensible ROI scrutiny. A consultant advising on plan design who can point to the OnMed CareStation^®' and its' built-in utilization and outcomes data—58% of visits that would otherwise have gone to the ED, chronic conditions caught at the point of care—has a stronger, evidence-based case to bring into the renewal conversation.