No question here (or only rhetorical ones).
I’M JUST VENTING.
I’M GOING THROUGH THIS SHIT NOW
WHAT A FPITA
Maybe this should be in The Pit?
I turn 65 next month. Medicare kicks in on Monday. I have my card, I have my Medicare number. I’m sorting through the plans now, and signing up. I thought life gets easier when you’re retired? Silly, stupid Bullitt.
What a Government Operation.
WHAT A FPITA!!!
rant endeth
It gets much easier after the first time. If you’re still happy enough w the setup you’re arranging now, just sit still next year and it’ll all autorenew.
But yeah, it feels like was designed as the final exam for your working life. And an exam 90% of the class will flunk at least one section of.
Yes, I always wonder about politicians who talk about “Medicare for everyone” as a solution for universal health care. Clearly they have never had to go through this.
If there ever is universal health care in this country, I hope they carefully and impartially examine the Medicare experience, learn from that, then scrap it and start over from scratch.
I shouldn’t have to depend on it the first two and a half years that I have it. I kept the insurance I had through my work when I retired at 60, albeit at an increased rate. It’s still a lot cheaper than I’d get through ACA. My wife is insured through me and is 2 and a half years younger than me, so during that gap I’ll have both Medicare and Blue Cross. I don’t know this for sure, but I’m guessing I can use it as an opportunity to see first hand what Medicare will and won’t cover.
There are companies that will help you sort it out for a fee.
By law, Medicare is secondary to any employer insurance. So Medicare won’t spend a penny until your employer insurance denies some claim as medically unnecessary. Only then will they step in. Unless they make the same denial.
All your deductibles and OOPs and whatnot from your employer policy will be the same as if you didn’t have Medicare. None of that stuff can be submitted to Medicare for secondary reimbursement.
As such, what you’ll be experiencing these next years is totally not a test of how standalone Medicare might work for you after the employer plan is gone.
Sorry.
Oh well. If it weren’t so expensive (a little over 900 a month) I’d probably just keep it even after my wife turns 65. I’ve been very pleased with it, except for the time they tried not to cover my daughter’s emergency appendectomy because she had the temerity to need it when we were visiting a neighboring state. We did fight it successfully.
There’s also free assistance through volunteer programs for each state. In California, here’s a link to HICAP. Here in Oregon, they’re called SHIBA. I use them every year to narrow down my best Part D coverage, but they were especially helpful in sorting through the gobbledygook when I first signed up for Medigap.
Good luck!
Or you can contact your local SHIP agency. They don’t charge a fee and aren’t affiliated with any insurer.
ETA: Curse you, @Aspenglow!
< cackle!! >
My employer discontinued our insurance in December. Everyone over 65 has to use Medicare. We get reimbursed 100 per cent but it has indeed been a shitshow.
I am getting to see how it all works with full reimbursement but what a headache.
Good luck!
Whoa — thank you! I’ma chekkinit out!
Added — truly a shitshow, @Ellecram .
Added 2 — oh I missed that! Thanks Thanks Thanks also, Beck! You ain’t so bad bad bad.
So glad “my” idea helps you. 
I’ve attended two classes for retirees about parsing all the Medicare options, and when I left them I was more confused than when I started. Fortunately (I hope), I live in California, and should be able to meet one-on-one with a HICAP volunteer to figure out what will work best for me. I turn 65 in a few months, so I better get a move on!
(Thanks for the reminder, @Aspenglow !)
Let’s not forget the ultimate guide to all things Medicare. No Doper should get past age 64-1/2 (or let their older spouse get past that age) without a thorough reading cover to cover.
It’s now 5 years old, plus subsequent addenda, but the big picture remains valid even if certain details of Medicare have been tweaked by one administration or the next.
Thanks @LSLGuy .
Here’s another product nobody in their early 60s should be without.
It’s all but imposible to piece together a coherent understanding of all this crap from purely online resources. Online is too much looking at the universe through a soda straw. And way too much content written by people (or bots) who don’t understand it themselves.
A book, whether paper or e-, is a vastly better tool for a large mass of semi-arbitrary detail, and these folks have one of the best. Your library may have a copy if you’re disinclined to spend $23.
So glad if it helps you! They were invaluable to me here in Oregon when I went through this a few years ago, as was the thread referenced by @LSLGuy below. One thing I’ll add about HICAP is, remember they are all volunteers, and as such, some will be much more knowledgeable than others. If you don’t get all your questions answered the first time you talk with someone, don’t be afraid to try again with a different volunteer.
The best thing I learned from @JohnT’s thread was this: In most cases, if you can afford the monthly premiums, just shop for the least expensive Medigap (Supplement) plan. This is traditional Medicare. Every insurer that offers it is required by law to provide the exact same coverage, and the only difference is price. Advantage plans sound great up front, but as you age out and require more care, they may haggle with you over what they will cover and what they won’t. Do ask your HICAP helper to confirm this, though, for your own individual situation.
Trust me, you can never start too early to research all this! No sooner will have have the main plan figured out, than you’ll have to move on to Part D for your prescription coverage. That’s a real shell game, too.
Do yourselves a favor and get all your maintenance prescription medicines listed for the HICAP volunteer: The full names of the drugs, the doses, even what form the dose is delivered, whether a tablet or something else. They can then run your particular drugs through their software to determine which insurance carrier will give you the best deal each year for what you take. Yes, you, too, will be bothering your HICAP volunteers every year for help with this – as do I.
Two years ago, I saved close to $1,000 for the very same drugs just by changing providers. This year, my Part D carrier was still the best deal going, so I didn’t have to change. Nice when it happens, but I sure don’t count on it.
Another issue is that if you start on an Advantage plan switching to a medigap plan will require medical underwriting, with rates dependent on your pre-existing conditions.
I’m 67. Still employed and hence insured by my employer, but I see this shitstorm looming and I am so not looking forward to dealing with them.