Medigap Medicare Supplement Insurance Blog

Do you have a Medigap plan to help reduce your out-of-pocket costs wth Medicare?  If your answer is yes, you might want to consider adding a Medicare Part D plan to help with your prescription costs.  Prescriptions are one of the biggest expenses for seniors.

Medicare’s prescription drug program is called Medicare Part D and it is offered by private insurance companies. These companies and the various prescription plans that they make available are approved by Medicare. (more…)

Changing your Medicare coverage is often a good idea, particularly if you have had the same plan for several years. New plans come to market and you could miss out on better prices if you don’t compare your plan to newer ones. For example, when the new Plan M and Plan N became available in 2010, they became popular for low rates.

When you apply for a new plan, never cancel your old plan until the new one is approved. I recommend waiting until you receive your policy and new insurance card before canceling your old coverage. Incidentally, this means that if you are moving from a Medicare Advantage plan to a Medigap plan, you can drop your Advantage plan between Jan. 1 and Feb. 14. (more…)

The types of plans that help you add to your Medicare coverage changed in 2010 and some of Medicare’s rules changed in 2011, but how you shop for Medicare Supplement Insurance remains the same. You still need a lot of comparison-shopping to get the best value in Medicare Supplement Plans.

Depending on where you live, you may be able to use Medicare Advantage Plans, Medigap Plans and Prescription Drug Plans to pay for many of your health care needs. Each of these options comes with different coverage and different rules. The fastest way to weigh your options is with our professional help.  We work with supplementing Medicare every day and we’ve helped people figure out the best fit for their needs for many years. (more…)

Hospital bills, prescription medicines, and other medical expenses are a bigger problem during retirement when your income is reduced. That’s also the time when health care bills tend to increase, but that bad timing doesn’t have to completely drain your savings.  One very popular option for senior health care is known as Medicare Supplement Insurance or Medigap Insurance.  It comes in the form of 10 benefit packages that help out with hospital stays and doctor visits.

Recently, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield created Anthem Extras Packages for Medigap customers.  This plan provides extra benefits, such as coverage for dental and vision care in one convenient package.  It’s available as a stand-alone plan or in addition to one of the existing Medigap Plans. (more…)

Medicare deductibles, along with co-insurance and co-pay charges, can add up to thousands of dollars in medical debt, but Medicare is not your only option. Both Medicare Advantage Plans and Medigap Insurance can expand on the benefits available through traditional Medicare. Your health status may impact those choices, though.

As with conventional health insurance, insurers are permitted to decline applications for Medigap Plans if the applicant has a pre-existing condition. There are certain periods when Medigap Plans are “guaranteed issue.” That means your application cannot be declined no matter what pre-existing conditions you have. If you enroll during the first six months after turning 65 and they have Part B Medicare, no health questions will be asked. For those who are eligible for Medicare due to disability, You may find some other open enrollment opportunities, but it varies by state. (more…)

In August, the Congressional debate over who pays for budget cuts heard from the military. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta urged Congress not to trim more of the military budget at any cost. According to Panetta, we should increase taxes and cut Medicare and Social Security. Obviously, he’s not running for election, but will Congress follow his lead?

While the military’s budget was increased by over 70 percent just since 2001, this year is the first time that Medicare has paid for preventive health care. To be fair, it was paying for 80 percent of fixed fees for doctor care that could be deemed necessary to detect and/or prevent common diseases. Still, beneficiaries had to supplement their Medicare benefits with a Medicare Supplement insurance plan (a Medigap plan) to cover that last 20 percent or pay for it themselves. In tough economic times, that 20 percent could block access to essential preventive health care. (more…)

Medicare Supplement plans do raise their rates. However, contrary to popular belief, there is no annual enrollment period for Medicare Supplement plans. So, regardless of when you see an increase in your premiums, you may be able to find a better option as long as your health is relatively good. Insurers are still permitted to decline your application if they think you will have a lot of claims.

You may find a few open enrollment periods on Medigap insurance, but that’s up to the discretion of the insurance companies. Anthem, for example, is offering Medigap open enrollment until the end of 2011. They will let you change from your current Medigap plan to one with fewer benefits regardless of your health problems. (more…)

Medigap Insurance quotes are easy to obtain and can help tremendously in sorting through the many choices for Medicare supplement insurance. Medicare Supplements are standardized so there is no variation in coverage from one company to another. However, the prices and company reputations can vary quite a bit.

It does pay to shop around for the best way to meet your health care needs, and that’s true whether you’re looking at Medigap Plans or Medicare Advantage Plans.  But, it doesn’t have to be confusing or time-consuming.  It’s easy to request instant quotes to see what’s available in your state and what the prices are running. (more…)

People too often waste money on Medicare Supplemental Insurance.  It’s not that the coverage isn’t worthwhile.  It’s because more than 45 percent of Medicare beneficiaries have never compared their coverage options, according to a new National Council on Aging and United Healthcare poll.

Depending on where you live, you may be able to use Medicare Advantage Plans, Medigap Plans or Prescription Drug Plans to pay for many of your health care needs. Each of these options comes with different coverage and different rules. The fastest way to weigh your options is with our professional help.  We work with supplementing Medicare every day and we’ve helped people figure out the best fit for their needs for many years. (more…)

If you have Medicare, you have several different options that can add to your coverage.  To make it simple, you can either get your benefits from original Medicare with Medicare Supplement Insurance plans, or you can get similar benefits through one of many Medicare Advantage plans. If you go with an Advantage plan, a private insurance company will handle your Medicare benefits for doctor services, hospital care and prescription drugs.

Those benefits are also known as Medicare Part A for hospitalization, Part B for doctor services and Part D for prescription coverage. These Medicare Advantage plans are known as Medicare Part C, and an Advantage plan will effectively replace your government Medicare coverage. If you don’t have an Advantage plan available where you live, or you don’t like certain rules associated with that option, you can sign up for Original Medicare. (more…)

Wouldn’t it be simpler if Medicare would just pay for all of your doctor bills and any charges if you needed to go to the hospital? Trying to understand whether hospital bills are covered under the same benefit period or whether you have to meet Medicare’s Part B deductible to see a doctor can get really confusing.

Medigap plans or Medicare Supplement Insurance plans can simplify what is covered by filling in Medicare’s gaps. For instance, when Medicare pays for 80 percent of your doctor’s fee, Medigap can pay the rest of it. If a doctor charges more than Medicare’s pre-determined rate, Medicare Supplement Insurance can pay for whatever Medicare fails to cover. (more…)

The average Medicare beneficiary sees about seven different doctors. They also fill about 20 different prescriptions a year. When you add up all the out-of-pocket costs that Medicare beneficiaries may have for doctor bills and medicine, that’s just too hard to budget.

That’s why a lot of people have added Medicare Supplemental Insurance or Medigap Plans to help with those bills. These plans come in different “flavors” to let you pick coverage that you’re most likely to need. Why pay for something you rarely need? The plans with fewer benefits can mean lower premiums, but you still need to compare a plan from different insurance companies because the premiums will be different. And, quite possibly, the cost could vary by hundreds of dollars per year. (more…)

There are a lot of ideas being thrown around that could ultimately affect what Medicare covers and what Medicare Supplemental Insurance provides.  Medicare, itself, has expanded to pay for more health care that’s designed to help you maintain good health.

There’s also a new rating system for Medicare Advantage Plans that grants plans with the highest grade year-long open enrollment. High-ranking plans also get bigger subsidies, and that’s likely to keep their rates low. (more…)

You can’t say that one plan is better than another in all respects because different benefits fit some people’s needs better than others. It’s like comparing “apples and oranges.” Medicare Advantage plans are very different from Medigap Insurance plans.

Medicare Advantage plans replace traditional Medicare benefits with similar coverage provided by private insurance companies. While Medigap plans are also provided by private insurers, these policies add to Medicare benefits rather than replace them. For example, when Medicare pays 80 percent of your doctor bill, you could add a Medigap plan that would automatically cover the remaining 20 percent. (more…)

First of all, Medicare is divided into different types of coverage. The Original Medicare government benefits are known as Part A and B, and you can enroll in these when you turn 65 or need disability benefits for 24 months. Part A pays for hospitalization after a deductible and Part B covers doctor services after you’ve met a separate deductible. Most people only need to pay for Part B premiums.

You can add a Part D Prescription Drug plan to cover medication, too, and you can supplement your Medicare benefits with a Medigap plan. Here’s where it can get confusing. Medigap plans come with different coverage options and the plans are named with specific letters, such as Medigap Plan D. However, Part D Drug plans and Medigap Plan D are totally separate. (more…)

That’s a good question because the answer may surprise you. It’s the coverage, but not the price, that’s standardized for Medigap Insurance plans. While you can count on getting certain benefits from Medigap Plan F, for instance, you can’t count on paying the same premium as other Medicare beneficiaries are for the exact same coverage.

To “even the playing field,” compare what different insurance companies are charging for a particular Medicare Supplemental Insurance plan.  The companies that charge lower premiums are not allowed to reduce the coverage.  Medigap plan benefits are legally standardized so insurers have to follow Medicare’s rules. If you get Medigap Plan F, for example, it will have the same coverage regardless of which insurance company is providing it. (more…)

Unfortunately, the annual open enrollment period (October 15 to December 7) only applies to Medicare Advantage plans and Medicare Part D Prescription Drug plans. When you first become eligible for Medicare, you are entitled to open enrollment for Medicare Supplement plans because you can add one of 10 different forms of Medigap Insurance to fill  in gaps in Medicare’s coverage.

During the open enrollment period for Medigap plans, insurance companies cannot decline your application because your health requires a lot of medical attention. In fact, they don’t even ask about your health at that time.  This initial open enrollment period gives you a great opportunity to get whatever Medigap plan you prefer at the standard premium price regardless of your pre-existing conditions. (more…)

When comparing Medicare Supplement plans, it is important to understand the differences in benefits. For Medigap Plan F and Plan G, you’ll see that there is only one major difference between them. Plan G costs less because it won’t reimburse you for the Medicare Part B deductible.

That deductible is dropping from $162 in 2011 to $140 next year, so if Plan G premiums are low enough to save you more than $140 a year, why pay more for Plan F? You’d be wasting your money because you’d spend more on premiums than Plan F would reimburse you. Remember, too, that Medicare is now picking up all of the cost for preventive health care. (more…)

According to the AARP Public Policy Institute, 10 percent of those receiving Medicare benefits (more than 4 million people) spend more than $8,300 of their own money on health care per year. That can really eat a significant hole in retirement savings, and it’s one of the main reasons that people supplement Medicare with a Medigap plan.

Medicare Supplement plans pick up health care expenses that Medicare doesn’t cover. For instance, while Medicare makes you meet one deductible for doctor services and a different deductible for hospital care, certain Medigap plans reimburse you for what you spend before Medicare coverage begins. These plans can pay for both doctor and hospital services, so you don’t have to drain your savings. (more…)

Most Medicare beneficiaries who have Medicare Supplement Insurance (or Medigap) pay more than they need to because they didn’t compare rates.  The truth is, Medicare Supplemental Insurance plans have standardized benefits, but the prices vary widely.  While several companies may offer Medigap Plan F, for instance, they can all charge different premiums for it.

Shopping around could save you hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars per year.  This year, you may also want to check out the new Medigap Plans with the letters M and N.  Both plans have lower premiums than some of the other choices. (more…)