Matrix and TRISTAR Announce Strategic Partnership

Matrix Absence Management (Matrix), a leader in helping employers proactively manage employee absence, productivity and related payments, and TRISTAR Insurance Group (TRISTAR), the nation’s largest privately held third party claims administrator, have announced their intent to enter a strategic partnership to develop enhanced commercial and workers’ compensation services and build an integrated total absence platform for employers of all sizes.

Under the partnership announced today, Matrix commercial and workers’ compensation TPA business, which operates as Matrix Risk Management Solutions, will transfer to TRISTAR effective June 1, 2021. Client and staff assignments will remain intact, and service will continue uninterrupted, according to Mark Marsters, president and CEO of Matrix. “This continuity will help ensure clients receive the same, high level of service they currently enjoy through Matrix,” Marsters said.

An early leader in the outsourced absence management space, Matrix was founded in 1987 as a workers’ compensation administrator in San Jose, California. Today Matrix integrates short- and long-term disability, workers’ compensation, return-to-work services and personal/family and medical leave programs to help employers realize time, efficiency and productivity gains. Matrix is the integrated claims engine for sister company Reliance Standard Life Insurance Company.

“Recent developments worldwide, including the COVID-19 pandemic, and our ongoing commitment to delivering superior service and quality, prompted us to seek a TPA partner with the size, expertise and reputation to match our own,” Marsters said. “This partnership sets the stage for us to build a larger, more robust and comprehensive integrated disability management platform by joining Matrix’s celebrated absence management program with TRISTAR’s workers’ compensation TPA model.”

Founded in 1987, TRISTAR provides property and casualty and risk control services for self-insured employers, carriers and policyholders nationwide. TRISTAR’s core services include claim administration for workers’ compensation; general and professional liability, including products, automobile and specialty claims unique to their clientele. The company also provides benefits claim administration, loss control services, and a full line of managed care services.

“We believe the strategic business partnership with Matrix will allow us to showcase our national workers’ compensation expertise to an expanding market,” TRISTAR CEO Tom Veale stated, adding, “We could not be happier in finding Matrix and Reliance Standard as partners that share a common culture with our firm, dedicated to providing the highest level of service to our clients while also providing secure, long term careers for our employees.”

The partnership is slated to take effect June 1, 2021, with Matrix Risk Management Solutions staff and leadership being retained by TRISTAR.

Based on the premise that employees make up the most costly – and valuable – of a company’s resources, Matrix focuses on reducing the lost productivity suffered when employees miss work for any reason. This service portfolio, called Absence Solutions®, streamlines benefit delivery, simplifies administration and reduces overall benefit costs for companies nationwide. Headquartered in Phoenix, AZ, Matrix has service locations nationwide, including Phoenix, AZ; Hawthorne, NY; Santa Clara, CA; Austin, TX; and Portland, OR.

Matrix Absence Management and sister company Reliance Standard Life Insurance Company are members of the Tokio Marine Group. Tokio Marine Holdings, Inc., the ultimate holding company of the Tokio Marine Group, operates in the property and casualty insurance, reinsurance and life insurance sectors globally. The Group’s main operating subsidiary, Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire (TMNF), was founded in 1879 and is the oldest and leading property and casualty insurer in Japan.

TRISTAR is the largest privately held, third party claims administrator in the United States. Headquartered in Long Beach, California, TRISTAR employs approximately 750 professionals working in 30 offices or remotely throughout the country. TRISTAR provides excellent claims and risk management services to a variety of clients including self-insureds, insurance carriers, program underwriters, public entities and risk pools. Four divisions offer a wide range of integrated or unbundled risk management and insurance services to TRISTAR clients.

TRISTAR Risk Management provides property and casualty third party claims administration services to over 400 self-insured clients and hundreds of insured policy holders consisting of public entities, private corporations and captive pools.

TRISTAR Managed Care offers nurse case management, utilization review, medical bill review services and access to local, regional, and national preferred provider organizations.

TRISTAR Benefit Administrators provide group health third party administration services for self-insured employers and insured policy holders.

ASPEN Risk Management Group provides safety consulting, coaching and training, loss control surveys and ergonomic studies for TRISTAR clients, insurance carriers, brokers and program managers.