How to hire an actuarial consultant

How to hire an actuarial consultant, step by step

Here's a step-by-step actuarial consultant hiring guide:

• Step 1: Identify your hiring needs
• Step 2: Create an ideal candidate profile
• Step 3: Make a budget
• Step 4: Write an actuarial consultant job description
• Step 5: Post your job
• Step 6: Interview candidates
• Step 7: Send a job offer and onboard your new actuarial consultant
• Step 8: Go through the hiring process checklist

What does an actuarial consultant do?

Post an actuarial consultant job for free, promote it for a fee

Post free

1. Identify your hiring needs

   First, determine the employments status of the actuarial consultant you need to hire. Certain actuarial consultant roles might require a full-time employee, whereas others can be done by part-time workers or contractors.

   Determine employee vs contractor status

   Is the person you're thinking of hiring a US citizen or green card holder?

   Yes

   No

   Hiring the perfect actuarial consultant also involves considering the ideal background you'd like them to have. Depending on what industry or field they have experience in, they'll bring different skills to the job. It's also important to consider what levels of seniority and education the job requires and what kind of salary such a candidate would likely demand.

   The following list breaks down different types of actuarial consultants and their corresponding salaries.

   Type of Actuarial Consultant	Description	Hourly rate
   Actuarial Consultant	Actuaries analyze the financial costs of risk and uncertainty. They use mathematics, statistics, and financial theory to assess the risk that an event will occur, and they help businesses and clients develop policies that minimize the cost of that risk... Show more	$29-64
   Pricing Actuary	Pricing Actuaries are statisticians who work in either the financial or insurance industries. This position uses extensive math skills to determine the price of products by analyzing data and calculating risks... Show more	$14-63
   Health Actuary	Health Actuaries are responsible for assessing financial risk and calculating premium costs for healthcare and insurance companies. They are involved in analyzing statistical data and marketplace trends, reviewing plan reserves, preparing rate files, and creating aggregated health data-based monthly reports... Show more	$23-96

   Show more

2. Create an ideal candidate profile

   Common skills:

   • Project Management
   • Data Analysis
   • Medicaid
   • Financial Analysis
   • Client Relationships
   • SQL
   • PowerPoint
   • VBA
   • SAS
   • Health Insurance
   • GAAP
   • Retirement Plan
   • Calculation
   • Plan Design

   Check all skills

   Responsibilities:

   • Utilize SAS to manage and update the modeling dataset for both auto and home products.
   • Evaluate capitation agreements between provider groups and manage care plans, including commercial and Medicare populations.
   • Learned and run rate indications.
   • Train various new associates while transitioning to Medicaid.
   • Implement new GAAP assumption into POLY system and regression test.
   • Programme extensively in SAS on large databases also using JCL language.

   More actuarial consultant duties

3. Make a budget

   Including a salary range in your actuarial consultant job description is one of the best ways to attract top talent. An actuarial consultant can vary based on:

   • Location. For example, actuarial consultants' average salary in south dakota is 49% less than in new york.
   • Seniority. Entry-level actuarial consultants 55% less than senior-level actuarial consultants.
   • Certifications. An actuarial consultant with certifications usually earns a higher salary.
   • Company. Working for an established firm or a new start-up company can make a big difference in an actuarial consultant's salary.

   Average actuarial consultant salary

   $91,160yearly

   $43.83 hourly rate

   ---

   Entry-level actuarial consultant salary

   $61,000 yearly salary

   Updated January 22, 2026

   Average actuarial consultant salary by state

   Rank	State	Avg. salary	Hourly rate
   1	New York	$113,966	$55
   2	Massachusetts	$102,918	$49
   3	California	$100,958	$49
   4	Missouri	$100,882	$49
   5	Connecticut	$98,815	$48
   6	Virginia	$98,528	$47
   7	Washington	$93,756	$45
   8	District of Columbia	$92,366	$44
   9	Wisconsin	$91,396	$44
   10	New Jersey	$89,737	$43
   11	North Carolina	$89,447	$43
   12	Georgia	$88,151	$42
   13	Florida	$86,983	$42
   14	Texas	$86,104	$41
   15	Illinois	$85,565	$41
   16	Pennsylvania	$80,139	$39
   17	Colorado	$78,941	$38
   18	Michigan	$78,626	$38
   19	Indiana	$76,006	$37
   20	Arizona	$75,973	$37

   Average actuarial consultant salary by company

   Company

   Rank	Company	Average salary	Hourly rate	Job openings
   1	McKinsey & Company Inc	$132,893	$63.89	20
   2	Oliver Wyman	$119,694	$57.55
   3	AIG	$116,551	$56.03	30
   4	JPMorgan Chase & Co.	$113,824	$54.72	33
   5	Watson Wyatt	$109,678	$52.73
   6	M&T Bank	$108,606	$52.21
   7	MetLife	$108,426	$52.13	9
   8	Guidewire Software	$107,037	$51.46
   9	Ernst & Young	$106,118	$51.02	151
   10	Nationwide Financial	$106,112	$51.02
   11	MassMutual	$104,779	$50.37	4
   12	Pacific Mutual Holding	$102,986	$49.51
   13	AIR Worldwide	$102,217	$49.14
   14	Perr&Knight	$102,056	$49.07
   15	CNA Insurance	$100,783	$48.45	21
   16	Accenture	$100,571	$48.35	5
   17	Allied Solutions	$100,500	$48.32
   18	Church Mutual Insurance	$100,438	$48.29
   19	The Hartford	$100,397	$48.27	21
   20	Zurich	$100,248	$48.20	24

4. Writing an actuarial consultant job description

   A good actuarial consultant job description should include a few things:

   • Summary of the role
   • List of responsibilities
   • Required skills and experience

   Including a salary range and the first name of the hiring manager is also appreciated by candidates. Here's an example of an actuarial consultant job description:

   Actuarial consultant job description example

   At MetLife, we're leading the global transformation of an industry we've long defined. United in purpose, diverse in perspective, we're dedicated to making a difference in the lives of our customers.
   Role Value Proposition:
   
   MetLife's Group Life & Disability Pricing Team provides support to various key stakeholders including Underwriting, Finance, Actuarial, and Product teams. The primary objective of this role is to enhance data analytics capabilities for all disability pricing functions including assumption setting, supporting renewal data functionality within pricing tools, and conduct ad-hoc challenging pricing and reserving analysis. This role will be viewed as an expert on developing automation process solutions, building visualization dashboards, as well as developing & enhancing predictive models using software such as Alteryx, Power BI, R, and Python.
   
   Key Responsibilities:
   
   Conduct data mining and validation analysis from various large data sources in preparation for various pricing / reserving assumption studies across all disability products including LTD, STD, and Absence Management Solutions Create predictive models to enhance claim cost estimates Build visualization tools to analyze large volumes of data primarily to identify pricing strategy opportunities Automate quarterly claim incidence and termination studies Perform profitability analysis on all disability products Support disability manual rate study reviews
   
   Essential Business Experience and Technical Skills:
   
   Required:
   Bachelor's degree in actuarial science, math, statistics, economics, or related discipline. 3+ years of experience in data analytics, manipulating and analyzing large amounts of data, or similar experience. Strong analytical and problem-solving skills. Excellent communications skills.
   
   Preferred:
   Insurance industry experience is highly preferred in either Group products or P&C setting Experience with programming languages, such as VBA, SQL, Python, R, Alteryx, and Power BI Knowledge of Group Benefit products. Strong presentation, written, and project management skills. Ability to work independently. Actuarial designation ASA/ACAS or higher a plus but not required
   MetLife:
   
   MetLife, through its subsidiaries and affiliates, is one of the world's leading financial services companies, providing insurance, annuities, employee benefits and asset management to help its individual and institutional customers navigate their changing world. Founded in 1868, MetLife has operations in more than 40 countries and holds leading market positions in the United States, Japan, Latin America, Asia, Europe and the Middle East.
   
   We are one of the largest institutional investors in the U.S. with $642.4 billion of total assets under management as of March 31, 2021. We are ranked #46 on the Fortune 500 list for 2021. In 2020, we were named to the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) for the fifth year in a row. DJSI is a global index to track the leading sustainability-driven companies. We are proud to have been named to Fortune magazine's 2021 list of the “World's Most Admired Companies.”
   
   MetLife is committed to building a purpose-driven and inclusive culture that energizes our people. Our employees work every day to help build a more confident future for people around the world.
   
   We want to make it simple for all interested and qualified candidates to apply for employment opportunities with MetLife. For further information about how to request a reasonable accommodation, please click on the Disability Accommodations link below.
   
   MetLife is a proud Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer dedicated to attracting, retaining, and developing a diverse and inclusive workforce. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment at MetLife without regards to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, national origin, marital or domestic/civil partnership status, genetic information, citizenship status, uniformed service member or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
   
   MetLife maintains a drug-free workplace.

   Copy this example

   

5. Post your job

   To find the right actuarial consultant for your business, consider trying out a few different recruiting strategies:

   • Consider internal talent. One of the most important sources of talent for any company is its existing workforce.
   • Ask for referrals. Reach out to friends, family members, and current employees and ask if they know or have worked with actuarial consultants they would recommend.
   • Recruit at local colleges. Attend job fairs at local colleges to recruit actuarial consultants who meet your education requirements.
   • Social media platforms. LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter now have more than 3.5 billion users, and you can use social media to reach potential job candidates.

   Post your job online:

   • Post your actuarial consultant job on Zippia to find and recruit actuarial consultant candidates who meet your exact specifications.
   • Use field-specific websites.
   • Post a job on free websites.

6. Interview candidates

   Recruiting actuarial consultants requires you to bring your A-game to the interview process. The first interview should introduce the company and the role to the candidate as much as they present their background experience and reasons for applying for the job. During later interviews, you can go into more detail about the technical details of the job and ask behavioral questions to gauge how they'd fit into your current company culture.

   It's also good to ask about candidates' unique skills and talents. You can move on to the technical interview if a candidate is good enough for the next step.

   While interviews are great, you will only sometimes learn enough from a conversation with an actuarial consultant applicant. In those cases, having candidates complete a test project can go a long way in figuring out who's the most likely to succeed in the role. If you aren't a technical person and don't know how to design an appropriate test, you can ask someone else on the team to create it or take a look at these websites to get a few ideas:

   • TestDome
   • CodeSignal
   • Testlify
   • BarRaiser
   • Coderbyte

   The right interview questions can help you assess a candidate's hard skills, behavioral intelligence, and soft skills.

7. Send a job offer and onboard your new actuarial consultant

   Once you have selected a candidate for the actuarial consultant position, it is time to create an offer letter. In addition to salary, the offer letter should include details about benefits and perks that are available to the employee. Ensuring your offer is competitive is vital, as qualified candidates may be considering other job opportunities. The candidate may wish to negotiate the terms of the offer, and it is important to be open to discussion and reach a mutually beneficial agreement. After the offer has been accepted, it is a good idea to formalize the agreement with a contract.

   You should also follow up with applicants who don't get the job with an email letting them know that you've filled the position.

   After that, you can create an onboarding schedule for a new actuarial consultant. Human Resources and the hiring manager should complete Employee Action Forms. Human Resources should also ensure that onboarding paperwork is completed, including I-9s, benefits enrollment, federal and state tax forms, etc., and that new employee files are created.

8. Go through the hiring process checklist

   • Determine employee type (full-time, part-time, contractor, etc.)
   • Submit a job requisition form to the HR department
   • Define job responsibilities and requirements
   • Establish budget and timeline
   • Determine hiring decision makers for the role
   • Write job description
   • Post job on job boards, company website, etc.
   • Promote the job internally
   • Process applications through applicant tracking system
   • Review resumes and cover letters
   • Shortlist candidates for screening
   • Hold phone/virtual interview screening with first round of candidates
   • Conduct in-person interviews with top candidates from first round
   • Score candidates based on weighted criteria (e.g., experience, education, background, cultural fit, skill set, etc.)
   • Conduct background checks on top candidates
   • Check references of top candidates
   • Consult with HR and hiring decision makers on job offer specifics
   • Extend offer to top candidate(s)
   • Receive formal job offer acceptance and signed employment contract
   • Inform other candidates that the position has been filled
   • Set and communicate onboarding schedule to new hire(s)
   • Complete new hire paperwork (i9, benefits enrollment, tax forms, etc.)

   Sign up to download full list

   Sign up

How much does it cost to hire an actuarial consultant?