How Many Companies Actually Renew Outside of January?

Every broker and company in the benefits space faces the same question around this time every year. Has the story been written until the next benefits election cycle in 2027? For nearly 1/3 of the market, the answer is no. At a time when your competition may think new business has dried up, you could be out there finding off-cycle deals. In Hillwinds data on employers with a single-employer health plan, 66% start their plan year on January 1. The other 34% renew in one of the other eleven months, and July 1 is the most common alternative.

January 1 is the default renewal date in employee benefits, and most of the industry's calendar is built around it. Open enrollment runs in the fall, quotes go out in late summer, and Q4 is the busy season.

But a third of employers aren't on that calendar. If you sell to employers, whether as a broker, carrier, TPA or benefits vendor, that third is the part of the market whose renewal is coming up while everyone else is looking at January.

We used Hillwinds data on health plan renewal dates to see how many companies actually renew outside January, and which ones.

Health plan renewals by month

Nearly every plan renews on the first of a month (99.9%). The chart above shows how those renewals are spread across the year. Three things stand out:

July 1 is the off-cycle default. At 6.4%, July is the clear #2. Nearly one in five off-cycle employers renews in July.

Off-cycle renewals happen year-round. No month outside January has less than 1.5% of plans. April through October together account for 25% of all renewals.

The quarter starts matter. April 1, July 1 and October 1 are three of the four most common off-cycle dates, which fits with employers that line their benefits up with a fiscal year.

The smaller the employer, the more likely it renews off-cycle

January 1 is close to universal at the top of the market and much less so further down.

Among employers with 100–249 plan participants, the core of the mid-market, four in ten renew outside January. Among employers with 5,000 or more, only about one in ten do.

That's why the answer depends on how you count. Weighted by covered employees, 79% of plan participants renew on January 1, because the biggest employers are almost all on the calendar year. But counted by employer, which is how a sales team counts its book, 34% of accounts renew in another month.

Fully insured plans are the least tied to January

Plans funded only through insurance contracts are the most likely to renew off-cycle. Just 54.4% renew January 1, compared with roughly 70% of plans that have a self-funded component (paid from the employer's general assets or a trust).

For carriers and brokers working the fully insured market, nearly half of the accounts they're chasing renew in some month other than January.

Education runs on a July calendar

Industry matters too. Schools and other education employers are the least likely to renew January 1, and 19.4% of them renew July 1, three times the overall rate. Their benefits follow the academic year.

Construction and hospitality employers are off-cycle more than 40% of the time. Finance, information and utilities employers are closest to the calendar year, at roughly 79% January 1. Health care, the largest industry in the data, has a notable July cluster at nearly 10%.

January's share is slowly growing

Off-cycle plans aren't disappearing, but the market is drifting toward the calendar year. Among single-employer health plans, the share starting January 1 rose from 60.8% in 2015 to 65.0% in 2023, a small increase almost every year.

What this means if you sell into benefits

Q4 isn't the only season. With one in three employers renewing off-cycle, there's a renewal coming up in every month of the year. Teams that only prospect against January 1 skip a third of the market.

Off-cycle accounts get less attention. When most of the industry is buried in January renewals, a July or October renewal is easier to get a meeting about.

Know the date before you reach out. Renewal work starts months before the effective date. Reaching out to a July 1 renewal in May is late; reaching out in March isn't.

Counted by covered employees, January 1 looks like the whole market. Counted by account, which is how a sales team counts its book, one in three renews in another month.

Hillwinds data includes each employer's plan renewal date, so you can filter a territory by renewal month and build an off-cycle list instead of guessing. For what happens once those renewals arrive — how often the carrier or broker changes, and how much the premium moves — see the renewal study.