With a week left before the current enrolling period ends, I was wondering if any of us got an Obamacare plan and what your thoughts are about it? I’m also interested in if you switched from another plan, or if this was the first insurance plan you’ve had since whenever.
I’m asking because a comparable Obamacare health insurance+dental plan is $300/month less than what I’m paying now and am wondering about peoples experiences with the insurance(s). I find it interesting to note that the plan, which looks to be better than my current one, is offered by my current insurer.
So please tell us of your experiences and opinions regarding your new Obamacare plan.
(If you want to generally rant about Obamacare or subsidies or any other aspect of the policy you don’t like, there are plenty of threads out there looking for your voice. )
I’m covered through work and my kids through medicare. My wife had very crappy insurance before which apparently did not meet ACA’s minimum standards, so we got the standard cancellation notice. Our new Silver plan is more expensive in terms of premiums, but has much better deductible, out of pocket, and other things so I’m basically happy with it.
When I say it’s more expensive, though, I mean by quite a bit–was $175 per month, is now $340.
There’s just 2 of us on our small business’s health plan. I need my biz partner’s wife to go look at plans and see if we could save money - including their out-of-pocket expenses - if we switched plans. She hasn’t done so, so we’re not switching.
Totally would. Just too much work on our part right now. Maybe next year.
I couldn’t afford healthcare before. I did the whole young adult without coverage - young adult now able to re-enroll on parents’ coverage until 26 - young adult aged out of healthcare thing.
Premiums for my state have been cut in more than half due to the ACA, to the point that I can now afford insurance. On top of that, subsidies would have made it possible for just me to afford it if my husband had still been out of work at the time.
I have made no use of the insurance thus far other than picking up birth control, which is now free. Considering that my BC costs $100 out of pocket, that has also been a cost benefit worth a large portion of the premium I pay. That and since I am required to see a doctor to renew the script (a visit which is 100% covered), that’s also rolled in as a benefit. My insurance will also pay for my gym membership, which is yet another value. All in all, I’m not paying a whole lot more than I would be paying for these items out of pocket without insurance - and of course I get all the benefits of having insurance. It’s a silver level too, so it’s an above-average plan in my opinion. I won’t go destitute from an ER visit, I’ll tell you that.
My local hospital and scads of doctors in the hospital network take my plan’s insurance, so I feel like I have plenty of options. I hadn’t settled on a doctor I liked in this area yet so I’m fine trying out some new practices in the name of a new insurance provider.
Yes, I enrolled on the Healthcare.gov website, and my coverage began Jan. 1st. This is the only health insurance I have had since my COBRA ran out in 2010. I just couldn’t afford an individual plan. I have a new doctor that I like, my preferred hospital is in the network, and my policy is the best I have ever had. $750 annual deductible, $1500 total annual out of pocket, no coinsurance, $20 doctor copay, $15 generic prescriptions.
$106.58 per month premium.
None of the dire predictions made by the Obamacare haters came to pass.
It took me two hours of looking at the website, double checking the premiums/deductibles/prescriptions/doctors/hospitals/etc involved, and filling in my personal information. Granted, I had never had the chance to fully pick my own insurance before so I spent a lot of time double-checking to make sure I was picking what I thought I was picking and comparing different plan levels.
After clicking the “Accept” button on the ACA website, the provider I selected sent me an email within 24 hours saying essentially, “Please log in to our own website to pay your first month’s premium and you’ll be good to go!” They had printable cards right there on their website until my official cards arrived in the mail.
It was very much a poof! I’m insured. I literally paid my premium less than a week before the end of 2013 and went and picked up my first prescription January 2nd with no hassle.
The provider did apparently have trouble processing the glut of new applicants in February - they sent their bill out late (late even via email) and consequently they extended the payment deadline for February by a month. I have had no issues otherwise.
It took a while. I started applying when the federal exchange opened on Oct. 1st. The website didn’t work, but I kept trying, a couple of times a week, until Nov. 5th, it finally went through. Then I started contacting my provider; they didn’t receive my file from the federal website until Dec. 16. I made my first payment in late December, and my payment didn’t clear my provider until Jan. 10. But my coverage began on Jan 1.
Family of three. We were paying $900/mo on my husband’s former workplace’s small group plan, then $1000/mo on COBRA after he quit. We enrolled last year and our coverage started January 1 for around $400/mo. It absolutely and 100% made it possible for him to start his own business. No way we would have been able to do it otherwise; I’ve been rejected for private insurance before and with a toddler, we can’t go without it.
What is your point? The purpose of Obamacare is to make health insurance affordable. In my case, that means a premium subsidy from the government. That is no secret. It’s not like your taxes go up because I get a subsidy.
I won’t go on much about this, but the premium is affordable to you. However, the cost of the premium hasn’t changed so someone, somewhere is paying for it.
And you are incorrect about the subsides. The ACA is supposed to pay about half the cost of subsides from savings in Medicare, a quarter from taxes on medical devices and drug companies and the last from a tax on the wealthy.
I’ve had Obamacare since Jan 1. My prescriptions are cheaper (using Loach math), but my allergist and therapist are out of network.
In fact there’s only one psychiatrist in all of Charlotte that takes my plan, which is dismaying. I haven’t switched yet. There are general Novant medical clinics EVERYWHERE, though, including within walking distance, so once I buckle down and get myself an in-network doctor for meds maintenance, everything will be peachy.
$420 for a premium plan, no subsidy yet, I assume after this tax season I’ll qualify.
Before Obamacare, I could not get health insurance. I work three part time jobs and was considered “uninsurable” by the major players. THEY WOULD NOT SELL ME AN INDIVIDUAL POLICY. For any amount of money.
It took 20 hours over three attempts over two months to get enrolled, thanks to the website snafus. Then it took past Jan 1 to get paperwork from my health insurance provider.
Nope: I only qualified for Medi-Cal (California state indigent coverage) and they bounced me for not filling in all the paperwork. (Okay, my fault.) So I have to start all over.
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