How to sell ICHRA: find the employers with a real reason to look

How do you sell ICHRA to employers?

Sell ICHRA first to employers that have said they are weighing it, then to employers under specific, dated pressure with a review on the calendar. Everything else is fit. A multistate team, an hourly workforce or a small headcount makes ICHRA plausible, and none of it shows an employer is looking. Use fit to filter a list, never to rank it.

The order matters because the decision is big: whether to stop offering a group plan to some or all staff, or to offer health coverage for the first time. That runs through the owner, the CFO or a board, and it is tied to a plan year.

This guide is for ICHRA and CHOICE platforms, administrators and advisers, and benefits brokers adding ICHRA. For the wider picture, start with employee benefits sales.

How strong is the evidence? A five-step ladder for ICHRA prospects

Grade every employer on the same ladder before anyone writes a first touch, from what the employer said itself down to what you inferred.

Then keep three groups apart and never relabel one as another: employers with a current opportunity they confirmed; employers with dated, explicit ICHRA interest whose status nobody has rechecked; and employers whose fit or interest is inferred. A later closure does not erase earlier interest, but it ends the opportunity.

A consultant recommending an ICHRA review is weaker than the employer commissioning one, and a committee scheduling an ICHRA presentation among other options is discussion, not a decision.

Which employers fit? The ICHRA rules that decide it

The rules below come from 29 CFR 2590.702-2 (eCFR text up to date as of October 2, 2026) and the IRS; the final rule generally applies to plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2020. This is context, not legal or tax advice; check the regulation's own text and have the employer's counsel confirm any design.

Two rules change how you sell. The notice rule sets a hard date: counting back 90 calendar days from a January 1, 2027 plan year start lands on October 3, 2026 (our arithmetic from the rule). An employer still debating ICHRA after that may mean a later plan year, so ask which one. And because the ban on choice applies within a class, a mixed design (group plan for salaried staff, ICHRA for hourly) puts employers that would never drop the group plan entirely in play. Check headcount by class first.

• Individual coverage is required. The participant and any covered dependents must be enrolled in individual health insurance coverage (or Medicare, under the rule's Medicare conditions) for each month the HRA covers them.
• No choice inside a class. No one may be offered a choice between an ICHRA and a traditional group plan. One class can get the group plan and another ICHRA.
• Same terms within a class. Amounts can rise with covered dependents and with age, but the oldest participant's maximum can be no more than three times the youngest's.
• Ten classes, plus combinations: full-time, part-time, salaried, non-salaried (such as hourly), employees whose main work site is in the same rating area, seasonal, collective bargaining, employees still in a waiting period, non-resident aliens with no US-based income, and employees a staffing firm hired for temporary placement with its customers.
• Minimum class sizes apply only when mixing group plan and ICHRA classes, and only to certain classes: 10 at employers with fewer than 100 employees, 10 percent (rounded down) at 100 to 200, and 20 above 200.
• Written notice at least 90 calendar days before each plan year. People who become eligible later, and employees of an employer established less than 120 days before its first plan year, get notice by the date the HRA can first take effect for them.
• ALE status: at least 50 full-time employees, including full-time equivalents, on average during the prior year; full time means 30 hours of service a week or 130 a month. For ALEs, CMS notes, eligibility decisions may affect ACA employer shared responsibility.

ICHRA vs QSEHRA: the difference for a seller

A QSEHRA is only for employers that are not applicable large employers and that offer no group health plan, including an HRA or a health FSA, to any employee, and the IRS caps 2026 QSEHRA payments at $6,450 ($13,100 for family coverage). An ICHRA has no such size test and can run beside a group plan, as long as no participant is offered a choice between the two.

So QSEHRA is a small-employer conversation, while ICHRA can stay on the table past 50 full-time employees.

Is ICHRA now called a CHOICE Arrangement?

In CMS and SBA materials, yes, since September 3, 2026. That day the SBA joined HHS and CMS to announce CHOICE Arrangements, "Formerly known as Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangements (ICHRAs)", and SBA's release says the agencies "unveiled the rebranded program". CMS repeated it on September 14, 2026.

The regulation did not take the new name. The eCFR text, up to date as of October 2, 2026, still says "individual coverage HRA", and the rules above come from that text. No law created CHOICE Arrangements. H.R. 6703, the Lower Health Care Premiums for All Americans Act, would define a "custom health option and individual care expense arrangement" in the version the House passed 216 to 211 on December 17, 2025. As of October 6, 2026, its latest action is "Received in the Senate" on December 18, 2025, and it is not law.

Use both names: CMS and SBA material says CHOICE Arrangement, and the regulation says individual coverage HRA.

How fast is ICHRA growing? What the industry's own data says

The HRA Council, a nonprofit trade association, publishes member-reported growth figures. Its report "Growth Trends for ICHRA & QSEHRA", Volume Five, released August 12, 2026, uses anonymized data that 17 member organizations shared for the benefit year as of January 31. It is not a census, and the Council calls the report a trailing indicator of adoption by design.

The Council says more than 20,000 US businesses offer ICHRA or QSEHRA in 2026. That figure combines both arrangements, and the Council calls it a floor. It reports growth several ways; quote the measure you mean, with its label. The report also says the rise "also reflects a net increase in data providers": a net gain of five members sharing data from the year before. Do not compute your own growth rate from its employer counts.

KFF's 2025 Employer Health Benefits Survey, a single survey of firms with ten or more workers (published October 22, 2025), measures something narrower. In KFF's words, 4% of offering firms and 9% of non-offering firms "offered funds to one or more of their employees to purchase non-group coverage" in 2025. That is not the same as offering an ICHRA, so never write it that way.

Why employers look at ICHRA, and why that is not proof

CMS's employer guide (last modified September 10, 2026) lists why an employer might explore a CHOICE Arrangement: group premiums that "have increased significantly from year to year", smaller employers offering "a health benefit for the first time", and workforces hard to support with a group plan, "such as those with employees in multiple states".

Each is a reason to look, never proof of looking; an employer facing a renewal increase may still renew.

Example (invented): a 45-person home-services company with hourly crews in three states fits on paper and sits at step 4. It moves to step 3 only when something dated happens, such as a group nonrenewal followed by a scheduled benefits review.

ICHRA moments: board votes, administrator requests and deferred reviews

Each moment below shows an ICHRA decision at one employer. The table places it on the ladder above and names the check to run first; the limit is part of the fact.

For an approved transition, first ask whether the administrator is already chosen; a board vote with a start month is the easiest moment to misread. A deferral is a dated reason to come back for the review the employer named, and a reason not to push this quarter.

Not moments at all: an employee's complaint, an anonymous question, a surge in reading about ICHRA, a plan already on ICHRA with no new review, a renewal date on its own. For the wider set, see benefits buying signals, the buying moment definition, and the benefits RFP guide for formal searches.

Who owns the ICHRA decision at an employer?

At smaller companies, usually the owner or CEO. At mid-sized ones, the CFO or controller with the head of HR or People, sometimes with a benefits manager who runs the comparison but does not sign. At public employers a board or council votes, and the person to reach runs the review.

A title is not authority, the contact you have may have moved on, and at a group of companies the decision may sit with the parent. If the employer is also weighing a change in how its group plan is funded, see level-funded vs fully insured.

How Clean finds employers with a real reason to look at ICHRA

Clean finds employers with a real reason to review their benefits, shows the evidence behind each one, and names the people who own the decision. For ICHRA and CHOICE providers, Clean separates employers that have said they are weighing the arrangement from employers that are only under cost pressure. Every reason comes with its evidence and its date, so your team can check it before reaching out.

You tell Clean which employers to look for by size, region, industry and funding, and who to leave out, such as current clients. Clean can research the employers already on your own list as well as find new ones, and it does not need employee health records, census files or claims data. When Clean cannot confirm something, such as the funding type or PEO status, it marks it unknown instead of guessing.

Clean works from real-world records. It is not a list vendor, a contact database or intent data, and it does not send messages; your team decides who to contact and what to say. See Clean for insurance and how Clean works, or book a demo to see employers in your market with a real reason to look at ICHRA, and who decides there.