Copy this Medicare sales agent job description template, plus the duties, licensing, pay, and role types you need to hire and coach top advisors.
AEP is only weeks away, and you need licensed advisors on the phones yesterday. So you open a blank posting and stare at it. (The cursor blinks back, unhelpfully.)
Two things decide whether a Medicare sales agent job description works: how clearly it covers licensing and compliance, and how well it plans around the enrollment windows that run the whole calendar.
We've spent enough time around high-volume Medicare brokerages to know what a strong posting needs to say. Below is one you can copy, plus the duties, pay, and role types worth hiring for.
Medicare sales agent job description: TL;DR
Template: A copy-and-paste posting with role summary, responsibilities, requirements, preferred skills, and pay.
Duties: Compliant inbound calls, needs analysis, plan comparison, enrollment in the right window, and annual reviews.
Requirements: A state health insurance license, annual AHIP certification, carrier certification, and CMS marketing rules.
Pay: Base plus commission or commission only, with renewals on top.
Role types: Captive, independent, inbound call center, and seasonal AEP agents.
Coaching: How call center teams onboard new advisors and score every call.
Medicare sales agent job description template
Here's a full template you can lift and adapt. Swap anything in [brackets] for your own details, and cut the lines that don't fit your team.
Job title: Medicare Sales Agent (Licensed Insurance Advisor)
Company: [Company name], [location or "Remote"]
Role summary: [Company name] is hiring licensed Medicare sales agents to help beneficiaries choose the right coverage. You'll take inbound calls, explain how Original Medicare works, run a compliant needs analysis, compare Medicare Advantage, Part D, and Medigap plans, and enroll clients during the correct election periods. This is a high-volume, consultative phone role with seasonal peaks around the Annual Enrollment Period.
Key responsibilities:
Answer inbound calls from Medicare beneficiaries and guide them through their options
Read the required TPMO disclaimer before discussing benefits [if you sell plans from more than one carrier]
Record a Scope of Appointment before discussing health needs, prescriptions, or plans
Run a full needs analysis: doctors, prescriptions, budget, and travel
Explain Original Medicare and how Medicare Advantage, Part D, and Medigap fit around it
Compare plans, recommend the best fit for each caller's situation, and complete enrollments within the right election period
Document every call and keep notes audit-ready for compliance
Follow up on pending applications and run annual plan reviews
Requirements:
Active state health insurance license (accident and health), or willingness to obtain one [if you sponsor licensing]
Current AHIP certification, carrier product certifications, and carrier appointments where your state requires them
Working knowledge of CMS marketing rules and TPMO requirements
High school diploma or equivalent
Comfort on a dialer and CRM while handling high call volume
Preferred skills:
Prior Medicare or insurance telesales experience
Patience and empathy with senior callers
Consultative discovery over hard closing
Bilingual (Spanish) a plus
Compensation and schedule:
[Base salary range] plus commission and renewals
Extended hours during AEP (October 15 to December 7)
[Remote, hybrid, or on-site]; [benefits: medical, dental, vision, and PTO]
That covers the posting. The rest of this guide explains what sits behind each section, so you can adapt it with confidence.
What a Medicare sales agent does day to day
On a Medicare floor, the day is a compliant, consultative call flow that repeats dozens of times a shift.
A caller picks up. The agent confirms who they're speaking with, reads the standardized TPMO disclaimer before getting into benefits, and records a Scope of Appointment before the plan conversation.
From there, a good advisor works through a familiar sequence:
Discovery: Ask about current doctors, prescriptions, chronic conditions, budget, and travel.
Plan comparison: Explain how Original Medicare works, then weigh Medicare Advantage (MA/MAPD), standalone Part D drug plans, and Medigap against what the caller actually needs.
Enrollment: Review the plan and enroll during the right window.
Follow-through: Confirm the application, then check back for annual reviews and plan changes.
Timing runs the whole role. The Annual Enrollment Period is October 15 to December 7, the Medicare Advantage Open Enrollment Period runs January 1 to March 31, and the rest of the year relies on people turning 65 and Special Enrollment Periods.
Because leads are mostly inbound (CMS bans cold calls, unsolicited texts, and voicemails to beneficiaries), speed to answer and discovery quality decide who converts. If you want to see how top teams turn that call flow into repeatable results, our breakdown of Medicare sales strategies for high-volume call centers goes deeper.
Requirements: Licensing, AHIP, and CMS compliance
This is where Medicare hiring gets specific, and where a vague posting costs you good applicants (or worse, non-compliant ones).
A state health insurance license comes first. Agents need an active accident and health license in each state they sell in. Some brokerages sponsor licensing for promising hires, so decide upfront whether yours is a required-before-start or supported-after-hire role, and say so in the posting.
AHIP certification is annual. Most carriers require agents to pass AHIP plus product-specific certifications before they can sell Medicare Advantage or Part D, and both have to be completed again every plan year.
CMS marketing rules govern the calls themselves. Agents have to read the standardized TPMO disclaimer before discussing benefits, record a Scope of Appointment before the plan conversation, and record every marketing and sales call, keeping recordings for at least six years.
These requirements shift with each plan year, so keep your compliance team close to the current CMS guidance.
None of this is optional, and it's part of why regulated selling has its own playbook. If your team sits inside a larger healthcare operation, these healthcare call center best practices cover the compliance side in more detail.
Be honest in the posting about the upfront work. The license exam and AHIP take real time and money, and candidates respect a company that names that clearly.
How Medicare sales agents get paid (and typical salary)
Medicare sales agents get paid through a base salary plus commission, or on a commission-only basis, with renewal commissions on top.
For Medicare Advantage and Part D, CMS caps commissions at a fair-market-value limit it updates each year, and it publishes what each plan pays agents and brokers. Renewals pay about half the first-year rate. Medigap commissions are set by each carrier, and CMS doesn't cap them.
So how much does a Medicare agent make per month? Roughly $2,900 to $7,900 for a Medicare Advantage sales agent, based on ZipRecruiter salary data (2026), with the biggest months during AEP. Here's how common roles land:
Role | Typical annual salary (25th to 75th percentile) |
|---|---|
Medicare Advantage Sales Agent | $35,000 to $95,000 |
Remote Medicare Insurance Agent | $44,500 to $77,000 |
Work-from-home Medicare Advantage Agent | $35,000 to $78,500 |
Director, Medicare Sales | $137,500 to $141,000 |
Live postings usually mix an hourly base with commission, which means income spikes hard during AEP and settles between enrollment periods. Captive agents trade lower commissions for provided leads and a steadier base, while independent agents earn more per sale but generate their own pipeline.
Types of Medicare sales agent roles
"Medicare sales agent" covers a few different jobs. Naming the right one in your posting saves you a stack of mismatched applicants.
Role type | What it means | Best for |
|---|---|---|
Captive agent | Represents one carrier; leads and training provided | New agents who want structure and a steadier base |
Independent agent/broker | Represents multiple carriers; compares plans across the market | Experienced agents who want higher commissions |
Inbound call-center agent | Fields lead-fed inbound calls at high volume | Telesales teams optimizing for enrollments per talk hour |
Seasonal (AEP) agent | Works the October to December enrollment surge | Scaling capacity for peak without year-round headcount |
That raises the common question: what's the difference between a broker and an agent? The real difference is captive vs. independent. A captive agent sells one carrier's plans, while an independent agent or broker compares plans from many carriers. Both are licensed, and CMS treats agents and brokers the same way.
What to screen for when hiring Medicare sales agents
The job description gets you applications. Your screening decides whether they become advisors who actually convert (and stay compliant).
We'd hire for coachability before a big AEP number. Most of your team won't be natural closers, and that's fine. The teams that win move their average advisors closer to how their best ones sell, and that only works when people can take feedback and adjust.
A few traits predict success on real calls:
Compliance discipline: Reads disclaimers verbatim and captures the Scope of Appointment on every call, even call 40 of the day.
Consultative instinct: Asks about doctors and prescriptions before pitching a plan.
Patience with seniors: Slows down, confirms understanding, and doesn't talk over a confused caller.
Coachability: Listens back to a call and changes behavior on the next one.
Build these into your interview. The right call center agent interview questions surface how a candidate handles objections and hesitation, and a repeatable process for hiring call center agents keeps quality steady when you're staffing up for AEP.
The traits worth hiring for are also the ones you can measure and coach once agents are on the phones.
How call center teams onboard and coach new Medicare agents
Alpharun’s coaching dashboard, showing a rep’s weekly coaching goal, playbook score, and call metrics compared with the team.
A strong job description fills seats. Getting your average advisors to sell like your best ones takes coaching, and on a Medicare floor, that's where the revenue lives.
Your advisors run hundreds of calls a month, but managers can only listen to a handful, so most coaching happens on a tiny, random sample. During AEP, when the stakes are highest, there's even less time to review calls and more compliance risk on every one.
Alpharun sits on top of your existing phone system and closes that loop. It builds a custom playbook from your top performers' calls, then scores every call against it, including a new hire's first week on the phones, so every advisor's coaching starts from real calls.
With Alpharun, Medicare teams can:
Score every call against a custom Medicare playbook, including the TPMO disclaimer, Scope of Appointment, and discovery steps
Flag missed disclosures and Scope of Appointment gaps for your compliance team
Deliver personalized post-call coaching to each advisor, tied to specific moments
Shorten ramp time so new hires reach quota faster
Give managers a weekly digest of which advisors need attention and where
Send advisors short coaching notes directly, taking work off the manager's plate
It also lets AI voice agents handle the repetitive parts, like after-hours scheduling and qualifying, so licensed advisors spend their time on calls that actually need a human.
This is how Medicare brokerages like Chapter run coaching across hundreds of advisors and hundreds of thousands of calls. The goal is to help every advisor sell like your best ones. For teams building that muscle, our guide to Medicare agent training at scale and our playbook for onboarding new advisors are good next reads.
Book a demo with Alpharun to see how it scores and coaches your Medicare calls.
Frequently asked questions
How do Medicare sales agents get paid?
Medicare sales agents get paid through a base salary plus commission, or on a commission-only basis, with renewal commissions each year a client stays enrolled. Medicare Advantage and Part D commissions are capped by CMS, while Medigap commissions are set by the carrier.
How much does a Medicare sales agent make per month?
A Medicare Advantage sales agent makes roughly $2,900 to $7,900 a month, based on ZipRecruiter's typical range of $35,000 to $95,000 a year (25th to 75th percentile). Income spikes during the Annual Enrollment Period and settles between enrollment windows, so monthly pay varies a lot across the year.
What is the difference between a Medicare broker and a Medicare agent?
The main difference is how many carriers they represent. A captive Medicare agent sells one carrier's plans, while an independent agent or broker compares plans from many carriers. In everyday use, "broker" and "independent agent" mean the same thing.
What license do you need to sell Medicare?
You need an active state health insurance license (accident and health) to sell Medicare, plus annual AHIP certification and carrier-specific product certifications. Some employers sponsor licensing for new hires, but AHIP and carrier certifications have to be completed again every plan year.
Is Medicare sales a good career?
Yes, Medicare sales can be a strong career, with a high earning ceiling and steady demand as more people age into Medicare. The tradeoffs are real: upfront licensing and AHIP costs, commission-based income, and an intense selling season each fall.
How hard is Medicare sales?
Medicare sales is hard at the start. Agents need a state license and AHIP certification before they can sell; they follow strict CMS rules on every call, and pay leans on commission with a heavy fall season. It gets easier once the licensing and compliance steps become routine, and agents who take coaching well tend to improve fastest.
