What sits behind your Snapshot.
Published benefit data gives your plan a comparison point. The pilot score remains a design assessment, with its assumptions shown separately.
Our references draw on the latest available KFF and AHRQ employer health benefits surveys, with additional benefits context from BLS. Sources and family scoring reviewed October 23, 2026. Survey years are shown with each comparison; the latest release can describe an earlier year.
How comparisons are chosen
Medical comparisons use available firm-size, location and plan-type estimates. Firm size means employees across the whole company, including all locations. Broader US or all-plan-type estimates are labeled when a closer reliable match is unavailable. Industry, employer sector and employee income are not matched. MEPS describes private-sector coverage; KFF includes private and non-federal public firms.
Family contribution scoring uses the published AHRQ MEPS-IC 2025 US private-sector distribution across medical plan types, including zero employee contributions. We use the available firm-size group when its required published cutoffs are reliable, complete and strictly increasing. Otherwise, the US all-size distribution is used and labeled. Unknown firm size also uses all sizes. This includes HSA-qualified plans: no HSA-specific family contribution distribution is used. KFF HSA-specific family means remain separate context and do not anchor the family score.
Other comparisons can use different sources and populations. HSA-qualified employee-only contributions use KFF HSA-qualified means where available. For other eligible means, a Louisiana cell with a 95% margin of error above 10% of its value gives way to an appropriate US comparison. When company size is known, an available same-size national contribution mean is preferred over a Louisiana all-size mean. The Louisiana estimate remains visible as context. Means are not medians; their sampling errors are not converted into market percentiles. Estimates from different surveys are not pooled.
The additional BLS premium comparisons describe national private-industry participants and remain separate from scoring. BLS reports employee/employer premium shares of 20%/80% for single coverage and 31%/69% for family coverage in March 2026, including participants without required employee contributions. Your employer contribution is not inferred from your payroll deduction.
How family premium contributions are scored
We compare the employee’s full medical premium deduction for employee, spouse and children. This excludes dental and vision premiums, employer-paid amounts, deductibles and spending for care. Annual amounts and monthly equivalents are shown together. The score describes payroll premium competitiveness; household affordability also depends on income and medical spending.
MEPS-IC 2025 Table I.G.2, family coverage publishes contribution percentiles. Benefit Grader maps the 25th percentile to 90/A, median to 80/B, 75th percentile to 70/C and 90th percentile to 60/D. Zero employee contribution earns 100. Scores interpolate linearly in dollars between these points. These score and letter assignments are our policy, not AHRQ grades.
Above the published 90th-percentile amount, the score equals 60 × that amount ÷ the entered annual contribution. There is no fixed dollar amount that forces a zero score. Published cutoffs have sampling uncertainty. A score between cutoffs does not establish an exact percentile rank.
The report identifies the selected distribution, source year and any broader comparison used. Published family means, including HSA-specific KFF means, remain labeled context. They do not replace the distribution’s median scoring anchor. The optional plan year is shown against the 2025 observed source year. These survey amounts are not adjusted for inflation.
What a pilot grade means
Published averages and distributions inform selected scoring references. Letter grades, weights and other scoring targets are Benefit Grader methodology. They are not grades published or endorsed by these sources.
The categories are Benefit value 30%, Financial protection 30%, Employee premium contributions 30% and Core benefit breadth 10%. Employee-only and family contribution scores each make up half of the premium category. Other than the family distribution method above, reference values map to 80/B under pilot curves whose endpoints remain design choices.
For copay plans with a positive deductible, a comparable raw deductible mean can inform the reference. Louisiana office-visit copays and coinsurance use MEPS-IC Tables II.F.5 and II.F.6, with $29 and 20.9% all-size means. The specialist reference is KFF 2026’s $46 mean (Figure 7.33, F9). Service definitions and deductible treatment can differ from the entered plan.
The out-of-pocket B reference is $5,000 for HSA-qualified plans and $4,000 for other plans, from KFF 2026 Figure 7.40: the upper edge of the first band reaching 50% of covered workers. These are distribution-based rubric points, not exact medians. The HSA score uses the maximum less guaranteed employer HSA funding; KFF describes raw limits. The worst endpoint is $8,500 for HSA-qualified plans and $10,600 for other plans. HSA net deductible remains a design target. Raw limits and employer HSA funding are compared separately.
Core breadth measures availability of five benefits. Retirement and PTO are optional context and never change this score. Funding is displayed separately. BLS March 2026 private-industry access is 72% for retirement and 80% for paid vacation. Match percentages and PTO days are not graded for generosity; vacation access is not a benchmark for combined PTO days.
A letter requires at least 80% scoring coverage in every category and overall, plus confirmed plan type and office visit structure. Partial scores are labeled; unknown benefits earn no availability credit. Letters use unrounded scores, with extra display precision near a boundary. An invalid scoring reference holds its component and the overall letter for review. Unknown facts stay unknown. Complete entries are not the same as independently verified facts.
National medical-cost context
These findings describe different populations, years and cost measures. They are not combined into an average and do not affect your grade. Average out-of-pocket spending is not a plan's out-of-pocket maximum.
Milliman · 2026 projected health-care cost
$8,460 per covered person in an average employer-sponsored PPO, including $1,266 in projected out-of-pocket spending.
Modeled total health-care costs include employer payments, employee contributions and out-of-pocket spending. These are not premium-only amounts. Figures are net of pharmacy rebates.
Milliman Medical Index 2026 · Published 2026-05
HCCI · 2023 observed claims spending
$6,743 per covered person under 65 in medical and prescription claims spending, including $923 paid out of pocket.
Based on employer-insurance claims from 2023, published in October 2026. Premiums are excluded; pharmacy spending is before manufacturer rebates.
HCCI 2023 Health Care Cost and Utilization Report · Published 2026-10
Aon · 2026 reported premium cost
$17,562 per employee in combined employer and employee medical and prescription premiums, including $3,130 from employee payroll contributions.
Public findings do not separate coverage tiers. Premium totals exclude out-of-pocket payments. These current-year figures were reported in August 2026 and are not an employee-only or family benchmark.
Aon Health Value Initiative, August 2026 public findings · Published 2026-08-20
AHRQ Medical Expenditure Panel Survey, Insurance Component, 2025 private-sector tables
Employees enrolled in employer-sponsored medical coverage at US private-sector establishments; Louisiana and US estimates by total firm employment.
Observation year 2025 · Published 2026-07 · Checked 2026-10-22
Public domain with attribution
KFF 2026 Employer Health Benefits Survey
US non-federal public and private firms with at least 10 workers; dollar estimates are weighted by covered workers, not equally by employers.
Observation year 2026 · Published 2026-10-22 · Checked 2026-10-22
Published aggregate factual estimates with attribution; no raw microdata
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employee Benefits in the United States, March 2026
U.S. private-industry workers in the National Compensation Survey, including full-time and part-time workers; reference period March 2026.
Observation year 2026 · Published 2026-09-25 · Checked 2026-10-22
Public domain with attribution
Milliman Medical Index 2026
Modeled average covered person in an employer-sponsored PPO; 2026 projected costs using large-employer utilization. Includes dependents.
Observation year 2026 · Published 2026-05 · Checked 2026-10-21
Free public report; cited aggregate findings. Report and underlying models remain Milliman's property.
HCCI 2023 Health Care Cost and Utilization Report
People under 65 with employer-sponsored insurance, including dependents and people with no claims; national estimates weighted by age, sex and geography.
Observation year 2023 · Published 2026-10 · Checked 2026-10-21
Free public report and summary findings with attribution; underlying claims data are separately licensed.
Aon Health Value Initiative, August 2026 public findings
Aon's participating US employer population: more than 1,100 employers representing 7.9 million employees. Public results do not separate employee-only and family coverage.
Observation year 2026 · Published 2026-08-20 · Checked 2026-10-21
Free public release; cited aggregate findings. Detailed proprietary benchmarking is not included.
Family deductibles and 2026 plan limits
MEPS-IC 2025 Table II.F.3 reports average family deductibles of $3,638 in Louisiana and $3,997 nationally among plans with family deductibles. These are context; family limits do not change the individual protection score.
For HSA-qualified plans, the numeric check uses minimum deductibles of $1,700 individual / $3,400 family and maximum out-of-pocket limits of $8,500 / $17,000, before employer HSA funding. Meeting these limits alone does not establish HSA eligibility.
IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-19 §2.01(2) · HHS 2026 limits, Table 6 and footnote (b): $10,600 / $21,200
KFF 2026 Figure 7.40: 50% of covered workers across all plans have raw OOP limits at or below $4,000; 61% in HSA-qualified plans have limits at or below $5,000.
Reference version public-references-2026-10-23-v8. Saved submissions retain their original facts, result and references. An owner can request a separate current-method preview without changing the saved assessment or sending emails. Client submissions are not automatically added to these benchmarks. Owner-approved custom benchmarks use their separately reviewed policy.