Houston, Texas · Est. 1996
Employee benefits, 401(k) and retirement plans, compliance services, and coverage for individuals and families — for Texas employers with 2 to 1,000 employees. Anyone can quote your insurance. What you are hiring is everything we do around the quote — starting with actually showing you every option on the market.
Thirty years advising Texas employers and families. Justin Boulet joined the practice in 2004.
From 2-person shops to groups above 300 lives — benefits, retirement and payroll under one roof.
We tell you upfront how fast we respond, and you get a team that knows your account — a person, the same business day, not a national queue.
We keep one plan record for your account, and both teams work from it. If something comes up in one pillar, we handle it inside that same relationship — you don't get sent somewhere else.
Group medical, dental, vision, life and disability — designed around your claims data, not a carrier's package.
Plan design, staying compliant with the federal retirement law known as ERISA, sending in contributions on time, and a fee comparison you can hand to an auditor.
Payroll that closes clean, 401(k) money sent in on time, ACA forms filed right — senior oversight without the $200k hire.
Health coverage, life insurance and real help for the people behind the businesses we serve — and their families.
Free tool · No sales call required
If you averaged 50 or more full-time employees last year — counting part-time hours added together as "full-time equivalents," so two half-time workers count as one full-timer — the IRS requires you to file Forms 1094-C and 1095-C. Most companies with variable-hour workers get this wrong. Payroll vendors miss it. Small CPA firms miss it. The penalty letters show up years later.
Our free review takes about three minutes: how many employees you have, their hours, what coverage you offer, and what you've already filed. You get a written report on where you stand — before the IRS sends you a letter.
Start the free ACA reviewThree separate penalties, three separate triggers — what each one costs per year:
Sources: IRS §4980H indexed amounts and information-return penalties for 2026; Rev. Proc. 2025-25 (9.96% affordability).
Individuals & families · English y español
Families don't shop for insurance the way companies do — so we built them their own corner of our site. Plain words, tap-through tools, and a licensed Texas advisor one call away when you want a human.
Answer a few plain-English questions and see where you stand — subsidies, networks, and what you'd actually pay.
Ten minutes, a few health questions, and coverage that protects your family's income — without a medical exam.
What a deductible really is, when you're allowed to enroll, how to fill in the forms — and every carrier's phone number in one place.
The principals
Michael E. Hipson founded the practice in 1996 — and clients still reach a principal, not a queue. Justin Boulet joined in 2004 and leads Compliance Services — and the individual and family coverage work clients quietly call the heart of the firm.
Between them they write everything on this site — the ACA guides, the renewal strategy, the family coverage work. No ghostwriters, no content farm.
Problem, method, result — real client work, told with consent. Details available on request.
Record 2025-04 · Manufacturing · 180 lives
Record 2025-09 · Energy services · 412 lives
Record 2026 · Group of 50 employees
Case records are published with written client consent and are historical; they are not a promise of comparable results. Outcomes vary by group, plan year, claims experience and carrier.
Built for the person who owns this problem
We become your entire back office. Renewals, claims escalations, ACA letters, the employee whose ID card never came — one number, one team, same business day.
Talk to a personNames shortened at client request · consent on file
"They navigated the insurance side of our son's ABA therapy so we could spend that energy on him instead."
"The 401(k) transition was documented start to finish. Our committee finally has minutes worth keeping."
"Michael answers his own phone. After two national brokers, that alone changed how we run renewals."
The Hipson Brief · on Substack
Plain-English pieces on ACA filings, 401(k) rules, benefit renewals and autism coverage — written by Michael Hipson and Justin Boulet, based on the questions clients actually ask. A podcast edition lives on the same feed.
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Three questions, ninety seconds. You will hear back the same business day — from a person who knows the account, not a queue.
2000 Dairy Ashford, Ste #360 · Houston, TX 77077
