What a Medicare campaign is on an offshore floor
A Medicare campaign is a call center campaign that finds people on Medicare who are open to talking about their coverage, confirms a few eligibility facts and connects them to a licensed insurance agent in the US. For floors in Pakistan and India it is usually the biggest US campaign by volume, and the most regulated one.
The plans being discussed are mostly Medicare Advantage, Medicare Supplement and Part D drug plans sold by private carriers. Your fronter discusses none of them. The fronter's job ends where the plan conversation begins. The licensed agent on the receiving end, often working for an agency or a field marketing organization, is the only person on the call who may talk about plans, benefits or costs.
That split is the first thing to train and the first thing to check in QA. A fronter who says "you could be getting more benefits" has already said too much.
When does the volume come? AEP, OEP and the rest of the year
The Annual Enrollment Period runs from October 15 to December 7. During it, people on Medicare can switch Medicare Advantage or Part D plans, and buyers want every qualified transfer they can get. Our AEP glossary entry has the one-line version for new hires.
From January 1 to March 31 there is the Medicare Advantage Open Enrollment Period, usually called OEP. It is narrower: people already in a Medicare Advantage plan can make one change. Buyers still take transfers, but criteria tighten and volume drops. Outside both windows, transfers depend on Special Enrollment Periods and people turning 65, and many buyers cut their daily caps or pause.
So a Medicare campaign is a seasonal business. You staff up in September and run hardest from mid-October. In October, 9:00 a.m. Eastern is 6:00 p.m. PKT and 6:30 p.m. IST. When US clocks fall back on the first Sunday of November, that moves to 7:00 p.m. PKT and 7:30 p.m. IST, right in the middle of AEP. And you need a plan for what those seats do in spring. Our post on getting bots live before AEP covers the timeline from the bot side.
CMS marketing rules, at the level a fronter needs
CMS, the federal agency that runs Medicare, sets marketing rules for carriers that flow down to agencies and third-party marketing organizations, which is where your floor sits in the chain. The rules are long, they change most years, and the reading your buyer's compliance team applies is the one that counts. Treat the list below as the general shape, not legal advice, and confirm specifics with your buyer and your own compliance counsel. The CMS marketing rules entry in our glossary is a starting point.
- Never say or imply you are Medicare, Social Security, CMS or any government office. "I'm calling from Medicare" or "your Medicare benefits department" gets a vendor cut off.
- Read the required third-party marketing disclaimer early in the call, word for word, in the version your buyer gives you.
- Record calls in full and keep the recordings for the period your contract states. Expect buyers to ask for them.
- No fear or false urgency. Nothing like "you'll lose your coverage" or "this is your last chance".
- No promises about benefits, savings or money on a card. Benefit details belong to the licensed agent and the plan documents.
- Respect consent and calling rules. Rules on how consent is collected and shared between companies have been tightened and challenged in recent years, so ask your buyer what consent record comes with your data.
Qualifying a Medicare caller: Part A, Part B and a few more
Most buyers' core question is whether the caller has both Medicare Part A and Part B. Medicare Advantage enrollment requires both, so a caller with only Part A is usually not transferable. Our note on Medicare Part B explains why Part B is the one callers are least sure about.
Beyond that, each buyer adds their own filters. The common ones:
- State, and sometimes ZIP, matched against where their agents are licensed.
- Age, usually 65 or older, though some buyers take people under 65 who are on Medicare because of a disability.
- Medicaid. Some buyers exclude callers who have both Medicare and Medicaid, others want exactly those callers for specific plan types.
- Whether the caller lives in a nursing home or has someone else handling their affairs.
- Whether the caller has reached that buyer recently, which is the duplicate check.
Ask it plainly, one question at a time
Make the fronter ask each qualifier as a single question and let the caller answer it. "You've got A and B, right?" is a leading question. When the agent finds out three minutes later that the caller has only Part A, the transfer comes back, and the recording shows exactly why.
The same goes for state. Callers who are keen to talk will sometimes say yes to anything. A fronter who asks "Which state do you live in?" gets a real answer. A fronter who asks "You're in Florida, yes?" gets agreement, and agreement is not qualification.
Write disqualifiers into the script as exits. If the caller doesn't have both parts, or lives outside the buyer's states, the fronter thanks them, ends politely and writes a disposition that says why. Don't transfer hoping the agent finds a way. They won't, and you will pay for it in your acceptance rate.
What the licensed agent needs from your handoff
The licensed agent is the reason the campaign exists, and floors that understand that agent's day get paid more. The agent is licensed in specific states, appointed with specific carriers and usually measured on enrollments per hour. Every transfer they take is time they can't spend on another. A transfer that lasts long enough to be billable but goes nowhere costs them most of all.
So the agent wants three things from your handoff: a caller who knows a licensed agent is about to speak with them about Medicare plans, the basic facts already collected so they don't have to re-ask, and no dead air. A warm transfer, where the fronter introduces the caller and stays on until the agent speaks, covers all of them.
Agents also have their own compliance steps before discussing specific plan types, and they will often re-confirm details your fronter already asked. That isn't the agent doubting your floor. It's their process, and your fronter should never try to save them time by describing plans.
What happens to a Medicare campaign after December 7?
The week after AEP closes is when most floors find out whether they planned the year or just the season. Buyers cut caps, some pause entirely, and the fronters you trained in September are suddenly waiting for transfers that the buyer no longer wants.
OEP from January 1 keeps some volume alive, but the caller is different. They are already in a Medicare Advantage plan and can make one change, so buyers often add a question about the caller's current plan type and become stricter on returns. Ask for the updated criteria in writing in late December rather than discovering them through returns in the first week of January.
After March, plan for a thinner year. Turning-65 and Special Enrollment transfers continue, and some buyers run them all year, but at a fraction of fall volume. Most floors move the spare seats onto a year-round campaign such as final expense, which uses a similar fronting skill set with a gentler pace. Keep your best Medicare fronters on the remaining Medicare work, because the buyers who stay through spring are the ones worth keeping for next AEP.
Keeping a Medicare buyer through the season
Before AEP, ask the buyer for their written transfer criteria, billable duration, duplicate window, return reasons and approved disclaimer text. Rehearse the script against those, not against a template. Our sample Medicare script shows the usual order and the disclaimer placement.
During the season, listen to a sample of transfers every day and score them against the buyer's return reasons. Watch transfer rate per fronter. A fronter whose numbers jump in week two has often started skipping the Part B question, and the returns will follow a few days later.
If you want more fronting capacity without a September hiring round, B3 Voice's Medicare fronter reads your approved disclosure on every call, confirms state and Part A and Part B, never quotes benefits or compares plans, and transfers only to your licensed agent, staying on until they answer. The full flow is on the Medicare bots page.
