Do you get sinus headaches? Obviously, I’m not qualified to diagnose you in person, much less over the internet, but that sounds a lot like the symptoms I used to get before I was prescribed a full array of allergy meds. It’s good that you’ll be seeing an actual doctor soon.
We ended up with Mr. Legend’s Medicare overlapping his dependent health coveragefrom my work by a month because of this. And then we had to spend months untangling the fight between BCBS and Humana over who was responsible for what. You just can’t escape bureaucracy!
Not unless one has a sinus behind and above the ear. Hopefully it’s not something serious, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m sent to get an MRI or a CTC or whatever you call it.
I have Anthem Plan G, and if I remember rightly, my first visit to a doc will be paid for by me, which should use up the deductible for the year. We’ll see how it goes. In the meantime, I’m taking it easy today so that I don’t aggravate whatever it is before tomorrow.
A fresh question for anyone who’s dealt with starting Medicare recently.
My whole life my wife and I have had medical insurance provided by her or my employer. As a result, we’ve always had the same insurance. Good or bad, it was the same for both of us.
She turned 65 couple months ago. I retire on my 65th birthday a couple months from now. When that happens we will both lose our current insurance which comes from my employer.
We intend to do some form of Medigap / Medicare Supplement insurance and are working through the selection process now.
That’s the facts; here’s the questions:
Is there any requirement that we have the same insurance carrier and plan?
If not, what are the pros or cons of doing so?
Does that mean we’ll be starting a whole fresh set of deductibles for just the last ~3 months of 2023, then re-start another fresh set of deductibles in Jan for 2024. In addition to the employer plan’s 2023 deductibles we’ve already met? Sounds expensive.
My understanding is that this is not exactly true. You cannot even begin the sign-up process before you are 64 years and 9 months, and your “initial enrollment period” runs from that date, until three months after your 65th birthday. If you don’t enroll during that period, there may be late enrollment penalties.
But, yes, if you want to make sure that your coverage is active the moment you turn 65, you should sign up before your birthday.
There’s no requirement for spouses to have the same coverage or plan. The only advantage I can see to having the same one is that you will only need to know the provisions/coverage/participating providers , etc of one plan. There won’t be much of a discount (if any) because even if you go with the same company/plan it will be separate policies. The disadvantage of having the same one is that it’s quite possible that the best plan for you is not the best one for your wife.( and vice versa).
We got a bit of a discount because we both signed up for the same plan with the same company (Anthem Plan G). It wasn’t a lot, but it’s something.
Both an initial broker I first consulted, and the topnotch advocate/broker that Hajario recommended, steered us toward Anthem Plan G. And a friend of mine who retired from my firm a couple of years ago was advised to buy the same plan. I think it might be a default choice for your average retiree. But all of this has taken place in California, and it might be different in other states.
In most cases you won’t sign up at the same time, so it would be hard to see how they could enforce such a requirements. My wife and I do, but only because I signed up 9 months before she did, was happy with my plan, and this made it easier for her to copy what I did. We have slightly different drug plans. Being different there is more reasonable because you might be taking different medicines, and so one plan would be better for your and the other better for her.
The only advantage of the same plan is amassing knowledge of how to deal with it.
Our Medigap plan has no deductibles, so I can’t help with the third point.
I doubt if there’s such a requirement, but in our case, my wife (13 months younger than me) got a small discount on her premiums for signing up with the same carrier. Since the coverage offered by all carriers is exactly the same, I would think that having the same company would be to your advantage, as you’ll only have to deal with one entity. I know I certainly find it easier to log into one website rather than two.
IIRC, deductibles reset on January 1 each year, so, yes, you’ll have to start over when you sign up, then start over again on 1/1/2024. But deductibles are just $226 for Plan G, so it’s not terribly expensive.
I cannot speak to a Medicare advantage plan, if that’s one of your possible options.
Hey, for those of us bitten by the “look-back” thing and we’re having to pay higher premiums for Parts B and D, has anyone tried appealing this to Social Security? Apparently, if you have a “life-changing event” that reduces your income, you can appeal to see if they’ll lower these premiums.
See an AARP article about this. It looks like retiring and switching to a lower income qualifies as a “life-changing event.”
I haven’t done it yet, but the retirement how-to guide from my employer and my union both say it’s completely standard in our situations to file that form upon retirement and maybe the year after too.
Approval is automatic if you can substantiate your numbers. Which isn’t hard.
Yes, it happened to me the year after I retired: six months back SSA benefits (I didn’t retire till I was over 70) and cashing out my accrued vacation put me over the threshold.
Step 1: I checked “Work Stoppage” and gave the day after my last day of work as the date.
Step 2: I used the AGI for the year after I retired.
Step 3: I checked “No”.
I included a letter from my employer’s Retirement Services department confirming the retirement date. About six weeks later I got a letter telling me that the surcharge had been rolled back and the excess I’d already paid would be refunded.
Disclaimer: this was four years ago and the form may have changed, but the process should be similar.
Apologies for the delay, it took me a bit to dig out the relevant documents (for some reason I never scanned them). And it turns out that my timeline was a little off since I was going from memory.
Anyway, to make a short story long, I retired in 2018 and the 2019 annual benefit increase went cleanly; it was the 2020 benefit increase — using 2018 as the lookback year — that went off the rails:
2019-11-27 — Annual benefit increase letter from SSA informing me that I would be paying an Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount (IRMAA) of $57.80 because my 2018 AGI exceeded the threshold, plus $12.80 for Medicare Part D.
2020-01-28 — Filed SSA-44 appealing the IRMAA (delay because I needed my 2019 AGI to confirm the reduction in income).
2020-04-12 — Letter from SSA telling me that the IRMAA was removed.
2020-04-15 — Letter from SSA giving me the revised benefit and informing me that the amount already paid would be refunded.
As to whether you can file immediately, all I can say with certainty is “good question.” It appears that our situations are different since I was hit by IRMAA as part of the annual benefit adjustment and it appears that yours was part of the initial determination. In any case you will probably need the AGI from a tax return showing a reduction in income. So your best bet is to *shudder* contact SSA.
Sorry if that’s not the answer you were looking/hoping for. Even though the timeline probably doesn’t apply, I’ll leaving it up in case it’s helpful to anyone else.
Since I posted the question, I’ve been reviewing everything I can find online on this subject. It looks like I can file right away with an estimate of what this year’s income will be. We’re in California, and this state has been given a delay to file taxes this year, so we haven’t done this yet. Given that, plus retiring mid-year and taking our social security benefits this year as well, made it so that I had to prepare a spreadsheet calculation estimating my total income this year. I think it’s pretty accurate.
“If the beneficiary has not filed a tax return for the current premium year, the beneficiary must provide us with an estimate for the more recent tax year. The beneficiary also has the option to give a second tax year estimate for the next premium year if the LCE also affects it. If he or she gives an estimate for the current premium year, but not for the next premium year, use the current year estimate for the next premium year.”
So I think I’m good with providing them an estimate and showing them some retirement documentation from my employer. I’ll go tomorrow to our local SS office as a walk-in and see how it goes.
I’ve been to the Social Security office with my completed SSA-44 form and attachments. I had no appointment (because it’s impossible to get one online or by calling), but was able to see someone right away. Thank goodness we have a little out-of-the-way SS office.
It was fine with them that I estimated this year’s income, and they took my little amateurish spreadsheet showing my figures. I brought with me the two letters from Social Security which stated how much extra they’d ding me monthly for Part B ($169), and how much extra for Part D ($31.50). Having these two letters in hand seemed to make a difference to them, and they said they’d start processing my SSA-44 right away. I should look for a “Letter of Adjustment” in the mail in about two weeks.
Sheesh. And then next year, when they do a “look-back” to 2022, I’ll have to do it all over again. We made more money in 2022 than in 2021, due to raises and the fact that Mr. brown started taking his Social Security benefits then.
Just a follow-up in case anyone else will be trying to do an IRMAA appeal.
I filed the SSA-44 form on 7/13, and four days later the amount which represented the overcharge by Social Security appeared back in our checking account. So it worked and it didn’t take months.
An extra note: I goofed on my form and didn’t fill in both our combined incomes, just my own income. The wording on the form could have been clearer. The very next day I came back with a corrected form and they took it no problem. The amount which was refunded was based on the numbers in my initial goof-up, so apparently they don’t review the attached documentation very well. In other words, I don’t think they go over your appeal with a fine-toothed comb. If you present a legible, filled-out form with pertinent backup information, I think it’ll go through without fuss. Just FYI.
Hopefully JohnT is still watching this thread. It’s open enrollment time again.
I took your advice and got a supplement Plan G with UHC and I haven’t any complaints beyond the crazy cost of prescriptions. I don’t know what to do about adding supplemental drug coverage.
I guess the other question is should I just roll this plan over or should I jump ship? Now’s the time.
If @JohnT doesn’t happen to get back to you in time, try this website to find free, trained, impartial advisors to help you wade thorough the morass.
Among other things, they can plug in the prescriptions you take and tell you which Part D drug plan will cover them with the least cost out of pocket to you.