Fred Garfield, CEBS, CFP®, ChFC, CLU, RHU

Fred Garfield is a Principal and Senior Vice President of the Horton Group. With more than thirty years of experience, Fred serves clients of 100 to 3,500 employees as an employee benefits and financial risk management consultant. He has earned the Certified Employee Benefits Specialist (CEBS), Certified Financial Planner (CFP®), Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU), Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC), Registered Health Underwriter (RHU), and Retirement Plans Associate (RPA) professional designations. These combined designations represent more than fifteen years of advanced study in this industry.

These abbreviations represent a highly qualified and talented specialist in this field, but Fred knows that all of these designations mean nothing if you can’t deliver on your promises. “The client service team and worksite wellness professionals at Horton have been incredible with their follow-through on critical services. Horton’s investment in talent to serve our clients has been critical to our growth.”

While Fred aggressively negotiates in the marketplace on a client’s behalf, what happens the rest of the year is the real value in Horton’s “strategic service schedule” process. Health plan claims and insurance costs are only a small part of the total “people cost” for a client. Fred knows an integrated, proactive approach can bring significant, longterm cost savings that can improve absenteeism, reduce disabilities and FMLA events, avoid workers compensation claims, and provide health and wellness improvements to improve the quality of employee’s lives.

If “a company’s wealth is their employees’ health,” then Fred’s goal is to create and oversee a strategic effort for maintaining human capital. “An auto dealer could not afford to provide a warranty to owners who do not change their oil and service their vehicle properly,” Fred states. “Similarly, we must help clients engage their employees so that they act responsibly, along with providing the education and resources necessary to keep employees healthy and avoid the most serious and costly health claims.”

Through this approach Fred has enabled many companies to “bend the curve” downward on medical cost inflation and receive premium rate reductions on renewals.