The first few months of the year are always the busiest for corporate healthcare renewals, and this time around, the conversations have quite a familiar feel.
Cost still opens the discussion, but it does not close it. Employers want to dig deeper.
Why are premiums rising again? What is driving those increases? And are employees really using what is fully available to them?
With employers facing higher national insurance contributions, rising wages, and business rates, healthcare spend is now under the same scrutiny.
In that context, reassurance on paper only goes so far. Employers want to understand how benefits work in practice and whether they are getting the most value.
Medical inflation setting the mood
Medical inflation sits behind almost every renewal conversation at present. Aon’s latest Global Medical Trend Rates report suggests the UK medical trend rate will ease from recent highs, but still sit at around 12% this year.
Even with some moderation, that keeps the UK among the most expensive healthcare markets globally.
For employers, that means another year of difficult decisions when it comes to healthcare benefits.
Advisers are increasingly being asked to help clients unpack not just the headline increase, but what is driving spend beneath it, and that naturally leads to questions about value.
Better data changing the discussion
Data now plays a much bigger role in renewal conversations, as employers try to gain a clearer picture of how employees are making use of the healthcare benefits available to them.
Even with NHS waiting lists now at their lowest level in almost three years, hospital treatment continues to account for the majority of usage across our healthcare trust clients.
Inpatient, day-case and outpatient care accounted for around 69% of total benefits usage in 2025, broadly unchanged from 2024. What has changed is where growth is coming from.
Usage of chronic condition benefits rose by 142%, year-on-year. Neurodiversity benefit usage increased by 69%, and digital healthcare pathways grew by 55%.
These figures point to employees using workplace healthcare to manage ongoing and specialist needs, not just single-use treatment.
For employers, that matters because these are the areas with the greatest impact over time. Long-term conditions, delayed diagnosis and unmet support needs are far more likely to affect absence, productivity and overall cost than one-off claims.
With the recent Keep Britain Working report placing greater emphasis on the role employers play in overall workforce health, understanding where healthcare demand is building helps organisations decide where earlier investment can make a real difference, rather than simply paying more once problems escalate.
How renewal thinking is changing in practice
We’re increasingly seeing employers stepping back and looking at healthcare more holistically.
It is not just about funding treatment when something goes wrong. There is more focus on how healthcare sits alongside occupational health, employee assistance programmes and virtual GP services, and how these work together day-to-day.
Employers want healthcare arrangements that support earlier intervention and recovery, particularly for long-term conditions, rather than simply paying for treatment at the end of the process.
That is especially true where absence and return to work are concerned, and where the wider impact of a health issue can extend well beyond the initial claim.
We are also seeing employers become more deliberate about how healthcare is structured and governed.
There is growing interest in approaches that allow employers to adjust benefits as workforce needs change, including tiered benefit design to extend access more widely while keeping spend under control.
At the same time, employers are becoming more hands-on in how healthcare trusts are governed, planning for how surpluses are used and how stop-loss protection is set.
Cancer support is a key example. While claims remain low in frequency, the impact on the healthcare fund can be significant when they occur.
Usage of our self-referral cancer pathway grew by 64% in 2025, reinforcing why employers are thinking more carefully about how high-cost risks are managed over the longer term.
What employers are taking away from this renewal season
For many employers, renewal is no longer just about absorbing another increase and moving on.
It is a moment to reassess whether healthcare spend is aligned with the realities employees are facing, and whether investment is supporting people early enough to make a difference.
In a market where medical inflation remains high, those decisions matter.
Renewal is becoming less about maintaining the status quo and more about making informed choices based on how healthcare is used in practice.
Employers who take that step are better placed to manage cost, support their workforce and avoid being caught off guard by the same pressures year after year.
