As a labour reference, BLS reports a $78,000 median annual wage in May 2025 for claims adjusters, examiners and investigators, and $79,280 within direct insurance carriers excluding life, health and medical. These are wages for broad occupations—not loaded property-production costs. (bls.gov)
For this desk’s proposed measurement standard:
Cost per accepted file = attributable production, review, correction, exception, reinspection and implementation costs for a defined cohort ÷ accepted files in that cohort.
Can a higher production fee still deliver a lower total cost?
Yes in a scenario; whether it does in practice must be measured. The following is a synthetic procurement example dated 20 October 2026. Every operational input is assumed, and both options eventually deliver 1,000 accepted files.
| Cost component per accepted file | Lower-fee option A | Higher-fee option B |
|---|---|---|
| Production charge | $120 | $150 |
| Review: assumed $60/hour, at 45 versus 15 minutes | $45 | $15 |
| Correction labour, allocated from cohort totals | $10 | $3 |
| Exceptions and attributable reinspection | $5 | $5 |
| Allocated implementation cost | $5 | $5 |
| Total cost per accepted file | $185 | $178 |
| Total for the 1,000-file cohort | $185,000 | $178,000 |
Option B’s $30 higher production fee is offset by $37 less review and correction work in this illustration. That is not a supplier performance claim.
The same framework must allow an improved internal team to win. Include its production time, supervision, training, software and review effort using the same allocation rules.
Keep three safeguards:
- Separate capacity from cash: label released staff hours separately from an approved budget reduction.
- Keep unfinished files visible: do not compare one option’s completed cohort with another option’s unresolved backlog.
- Hold evidence quality constant: lower estimates or fewer line items are not a valid proxy for better production.
Sources cited on this page
- bls.govbls.gov