Forgetting my insurance limitations

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della_anne

della_anne

Well-known member
Joined
May 2, 2004
Messages
84
Location
Chicago area
I am such a big dork! Reality just hit me today! Sometimes I think I forget that I have a major medical condition. I'm young! I don't want to think of myself as constricted, limited and debilitated. :(

I left my job about 2 weeks ago because unprofessional and unethical stuff was going on there. I knew I needed to get out of this job. Now for the big challenge: To find a new job. My friend gave me a good idea, move up to Wisconsin by her,away from parents, close to a friend, I thought it'd be a fun adventure and give me the space I needed to start my own life. I've been looking for a job in Wisconsin for 2 weeks with no luck yet.

And today reality hit. :( The bottom underlying motivator for me to get a permanent job is the fact that I have 9 months of insurance, thats it. I can't go without insurance. The company I used to work for was a small business, and small businesses lie not under COBRA, but under a Illinois Law that says that an employer of a small business has to cover a former employee for up to 9 months.

And now its as if alarms are going off inside my head. I need to fix this insurance problem as soon as possible because time is ticking away. And now I am thinking scrap the idea of moving to Wisconsin and focus on getting a temp to perm job through the temp agency. I think that's my best chance at getting employed. Theres alot of uncertainty that goes along with that though because you never know if your right for the job or how long it will take the company to want to hire you. But I think that it is my best chance.

It sucks that there is so much uncertainty involved with the job market. People with health conditions need stability and when you can't get that, it gets frustrating. Its disappointing and discouraging. It means that people with health conditions need to work harder to get what they need.

I will just have to keep working hard. One of the main ingredients to getting a job is positive attitide. As long as I have a positive attitude about all this then I should be able to get myself permenantly employed through the temp agency.

But anyway that's my story for this week. Thanks for listening and I'll keep you all updated as far as getting employment. :)
 
Danielle,
Unfortunately those of us with major medical problems don't have the freedom luxury the rest of the world might. You are correct, we are married to the need for a job to keep insurance (unless we are rich enough for it not to matter - yeah, not in my lifetime).:( :(
It is unfortunate that there is not a national COBRA group that covers people (temporarily) leaving small companies. I have the same situation at my one job. They are a company of less than 20 people and I would not be covered even by the state "COBRA" if I quit. In Ohio, if you voluntarily leave your small company job, you are not eligible for insurance continuation. I will either be here forever or have to find a job that covers me from day one (and we know how many of those there are out there - NOT).
I hope things work out for you. At least you have nine months to come up with a new job whereever it is. I do not see a reason to rule out a move to Wisconsin if that is what you really want to do. Just get started immediately. After all, you have to find a job somewhere. Might as well be somewhere you want to be.;) ;) :D
Good luck.
 
Insurance

Insurance

I too have been doing a lot of study concerning insurance questions. The first thing you probably want to know is what is "the worst case scenario" for your particularsituation. I live in New Mexico (hardly a progressive state in many ways), but we have a type of "assigned risk" insurance for those who can't get insurance elsewhere. It is expensive, but would be better than nothing.

I think you have to make the coverage issue a number 1 priority. A 24 hour lapse in coverage can make a HUGE difference. When I lived in Minnesota (I don't know how far you are from the border), there was a type of assigned risk that I believe covered those who couldn't get coverage elsewhere. It seems like I have made 500 phone calls as I search for health insurance at a lower cost. (We paid $300.00/mo for the two of us three years ago & the premium has since risen to $1,000.00.) If you never have a lapse in coverage, I believe you can get on a later employer's insurance plan without an exclusion for pre-existing conditions. What I am understanding is that if you have any lapse in coverage (even 1 day), I believe your next insurance company WILL stick you with exclusions from coverage from pre-existing conditions. It might even mean they would exclude you from all coverage period. As I mentioned in a different post, this seems to be the least discussed and understood problem confronting the members of this forum.

I know I didn't think about it much untill our premium costs took off. (Ours is not some fly by night outfit-we have our health insurance through my wife's 30 year employment with one of the biggest school districts in Minnesota). In real life there are many ways to find yourself uninsured. The premiums can exceed your ability to pay-your job can disappear-you can be hurt seriously enough to lose your job but not so seriously that you qualify for SSI, and the list goes on & on.

The bottom line is don't let the end of your insurance coverage sneak up on you. And when you have an idea as to how to solve your problem, keep asking questions until you are satisfied that you won't get caught uninsured. I fear if heart valvers ever have a lapse in coverage they will be paying premiums from the assigned risk pool for the rest of their lives.
 
My husband can't take early retirement because he can't keep his insurance at the same premium. It will cost over 300.00 a month just for him. I tried to put him on my insurance(county government) but they added a clause that says if hes offered insurance where he works he can't be covered by mine.
As long as he works, his insurance is 60.00 per month for both of us where he works. We already pay about 120.00 per month for his prescriptions. He will have to wait until he is closer to 62 to retire so he can draw his Social Security to help pay for his premiums. You don't think of these things when you are young and healthy.
 
This is such a huge, huge issue with anyone with a major medical current/past problem. Having insurance and NOT letting your coverage lapse is something that people don't often realize. Insurance companies can exclude you with a pre-existing clause (although many states have amended their right to do this and let insurance companies exclude you from coverage for whatever was pre-existing for X number of months, especially on transplants or heart related conditions).

I'm in human resources and benefits for a fairly small company (less than 50) and we're not obligated to offer COBRA, but we do, just as we're not obligated to offer FMLA for employees, but we do that also. It's only right and fair. COBRA is expensive and the option I let employees know is that there's short-term policies out there that you can tailor to your needs (i.e. Assurant and others). You can get a major medical policy that may keep you out of the lapsed coverage loop also.

One thing that struck me in this post was Terry's remark about her insurance company not allowing her husband to come onto her policy if he was offered insurance elsewhere. What about qualifying events? Do they preclude children onto your policy if your spouse has the opportunity to have healthcare coverage from their work? It sounds to me like they're forcing you to only cover yourself and no one else (sort of smart in a way, dependent coverage is the highest cost for an employer - but not very nice thing to do). It keeps their costs down but, what if your spouse's insurance suddenly jumped 200% and you couldn't afford it? That's a qualifying event to go onto your policy. I've never heard of such a thing.

When you switch jobs or switch healthcare coverage, always remember to get a Certificate of Coverage from your prior insurance company and keep it handy - you'll be asked over and over again from the new company to prove you had continuous coverage.
 
Actually I feel the young and healthy should think of insurance too. Here in Kansas City several years back the daughter of a former pro baseball player was in between jobs and was in a car wreck that made her a quadrapalegic instantly. Because she was in between jobs=no health coverage. She was fiinancially devastated also because of this tragedy. We never know what could happen in the blink of an eye, so even though someone may be young and have no health issues at the moment-you never know what could happen. Deb
 
This is the first year they have started the new rule about a spouse being offered insurance where they work and they can't be on our insurance. I know we can add new babies at any time. But, I am not sure if they would have to be added to mine or his(don't have to worry about that we have 9 grandchildren). I know our premiums have been steadily going up and the deductibles and co-pays higher. I am on a self -funded insurance through the county. There was talk of only offering Kaiser this year. We have a choice right now. There is not a Kaiser near me. I commute 28 miles to work.
 
Pam, the company I worked for changed their retirees' benefits to require any retiree who subsequently gets a job must take health insurance that's offered by the new job - irrespective of how inadequate it is - and as soon as they're eligible for the new insurance the company's insurance expires. How's that for a screw? This is Illinois, where insurance companies rule the roost (State Farm, Nationwide and Allstate are all domiciled here).
 
Georgia, I will have to check into that rule here. I was thinking about retiring early(because of my commute) and working closer to home for a few years until my Social Security kicked in at 62. But, I would hate to lose my insurance here. I get to keep it at the same premium I pay now. Of course, if any of the rules change after I retire they apply to me also. I thought we had planned and saved pretty well for our retirement but the insurance and co-pays are going to cut into our fun money. But, at least we our lucky to both have insurance.
 
Now, my ex-company's new rule (regarding buying other insurance) didn't apply to people who'd retired previously - only to those retiring in the future. But you know, some places have really poor policies with high copays and small maximum lifetime benefits - so even supplementing retirement income with a part-time job might screw up health insurance benefits. It made me so mad I could spit. And because I'd gotten increasingly suspicious of the way the company was treating its employees (apparently poor pay wasn't enough), I'd bailed out of their insurance and had gone with my hubby's it all was moot for me; but a lot of friends were terribly affected.
 
Certificate of Coverage

Certificate of Coverage

PamO said:
When you switch jobs or switch healthcare coverage, always remember to get a Certificate of Coverage from your prior insurance company and keep it handy - you'll be asked over and over again from the new company to prove you had continuous coverage.
Click to expand...

That is great advice, and if I hadn't read your post I am afraid I would have found out the hard way. I am afraid these "coverage games" are going to be more & more common. Although no one has arbitrarily reduced our benefits, they have raised the premium by 300% in 4 years, and we are compelled to look around for cheaper coverage. I'm just glad I had my surgery in time to stick them with the bill! I have a feeling that if my surgery had happened 5 or 10 years down the road I would have been stuck with a much greater "out of pocket" expense.
 
Maybe some Insurance options

Maybe some Insurance options

I did some research on this and made this post back on 5 Dec 2005 it may be of interest. This is a subject that obviously is not directly relevant to myself living on the other side of the world in a country with a universal public health system; however I have decided to do a little research on it because it is always such a hot topic. California runs a program for residents that allow them to be individually insured for 36 months even if they have chronic health problems and then provides for guaranteed acceptance with a regular insurance provider at the end of the period with only a 10% loading on the normal premium. I have included the link. http://www.insurance.ca.gov/0100-con...ries/mrmip.cfm Now I know most of you do not live California, however, according to the following document (page 32) on the Blue Cross site with strategy options to deal with the US uninsured medical problem. There are currently 32 states that run a similar program despite Federal funding having expired in 2004. http://www.bcbs.com/news/reference_g...sured_book.pdf I am not sure on what the eligibility criteria is in each state, however it could be worth your while following it up. I would be interested to read your comments. :)
 
I did have a scary few days last year. My private medical insurance is with BUPA in the UK and I pay annuallly on 28th June, it is charged to my credit card. I was given the date for my OHS, I was to be admitted on 29th June and the surgery was to take place on 30th. I contacted BUPA a few weeks before the surgery asking for authorisation for the surgery and was told that they couldn't do this until payment had been made. They also said that as I pay on a credit card it was not possible for me to pay my premium a few days early to ensure payment got through. On 29th I had to phone them to get the authorisation for me to be admitted that day. That was more stressful than the thought of OHS, the thought that I would have to pay the lot!
 
Sorry about the bad link

Sorry about the bad link

I should have checked the link before I reposted it. I have found a revised California link that describes the program for high risk people to get insurance. http://www.insurance.ca.gov/0100-consumers/0300-public-programs/0600-mrmip/index.cfm I will have a look when time allows to see if I can find a new link to the Blue Cross document. I may even have the PDF, however I am not sure if I can post this. :)
 
Thank you!

Thank you!

Thank you OldManEmu! I lost my insurance Jan 1 due to divorce. My daughter has a severly aortic biscupid valve, and I just found out my father has a bicuspid valve as well. Guess I am in for it, as the doctors always ask about a murmur.

I don't want to be caught without insurance. I was checking into your link, and tried to call a 1-800 number, but they are closed. Thank you for this info, as a single mom with four kids, a substitute teacher, I am too poor to pay for a regular premium. My hope is that I will get a regular teaching position next year, along with benefits.
 
Cloud - you might also look into any program CA has for insuring children (rather than the assigned risk/high risk program for adults). Most states have some sort of non-medicaid program for children that are quite affordable, and I don't think there's any requirement for having been turned down by regular insurers, and I also don't think the children in this category are underwritten. In Illinois this is called KidCare, and I believe the plan receives Federal matching funds.

It wouldn't take care of you, but having your daughter covered would relieve some of your worries.
 
Health Insurance

Health Insurance

Wow...I never realised that health insurance in America was so complicated! It's interesting to see what it's like elsewhere. In Ireland most people have their own private health insurance. It is not linked to your Job. Our family policy covers me, my husband and our daughter and we pay 104 euro per month (about 124 dollars). We do have to pay our GP ( your PCP) every time we see him. This would cost about 50 dollars a visit. We can claim a small amount of that back from our health insurance. We also have to pay for all our prescription medicines. A 5 day course of antibiotics would typically cost approx 15 dollars.

The 3 of us have been in hospital ( me mainly!) for various operations, tests etc and we have never had to pay for anything. The hospital settles the bill directly with the health ins company who then pay the doctors, labs etc.

As long as diagnostic tests are carried out as an "in patient" even a day care "in patient" everything is covered. Occassionally we might have to pay for something but some of this can be claimed back.

And would you believe that people here moan about health insurance :eek:

Personally I think we have it easy!

Maureen
 
Insurance

Insurance

Geebee,

Yeah, those small business laws for insurance are alot less leinient towards people with health conditions. Beofre my employer told me about this small business Illinois law, I had no clue that it existed. AND I should be thankful that my boss was nice enough to keep me on his company's insurance until the end of March.

What I did not know is that for small businesses in Illinois, you have to be on the employers plan for 3 months before you can be continued under their plan when you leave. When I left in February, I had only been on the plan for 2 months. oops! Guess I should have done some research before I decided to leave. but all is good cause my boss allowed me to stay on the plan.

I think its important to be aware of the insurance laws and just medical stuff in general. Because if you don't you could end up getting yourself into a lot of trouble, like I almost did.
 
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