“Insurance” Archive

On this page you will find the search results for the search term that you queried.

Oh My…It’s March, We Made It!

When we purchased our health insurance in December, we only signed up my husband and myself because my son was still covered through the state sponsored plan through the end of 2006. I figured that I would call and add him to start his coverage in January.

Well, I couldn’t do that. The earliest I could add him to our plan was March. I had thought about getting some short term health insurance for him because he is 5 years old and likes to jump off everything, but I didn’t. With life going on, it slipped my mind.

It didn’t even hit me until a few minutes ago that yesterday was March 1st. Our son is now on our policy. Yay!

All three of us have health insurance, we are contributing to a retirement account, we have money in a savings account, our debt is going down, and next week we will be having our exam for life insurance policies. Our financial house is slowly but surely getting the solid foundation that it needs.

Posted by Tricia on March 2, 2007 at 10:29 PM in Insurance | 4 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

As With Many Things in Life, There’s the Good News and Then the Bad News…

When you are focused on debt reduction, anything that involves or may involve spending non-budgeted money can really can bring you down. It hurts your progress and it does ding your morale.

We had something happen this weekend, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t bummed out a little. But as I’m sitting here writing about it, I thought about actually listing what was good about what happened and what is bad. It couldn’t hurt.

But first I’ll tell you what happened. We were driving home from shopping, and our oil light went on around a turn and then went off again. We drove just a few blocks to a gas station and checked the oil. It was low so we put oil in and started back on our way home.

About halfway there, the oil light came on again and was flickering. We drove a little bit and we stopped at a gas station again. My husband checked the oil again and it was fine and also looked for leaks. Everything seemed ok.

So we left again. A little bit later, the light stopped flickering and stayed on and we could hear a tinking sound from the engine. We immediately pulled over and said that was that. We weren’t making it home by driving our car.

Now, here’s the good news:

1.) Where we pulled over had a huge shoulder free of snow to pull over onto (not the case with the entire road).

2.) The weather was unseasonably warm for this time of year and it was a beautiful day.

3.) Someone was nice enough to let a stranger in their home to use their phone to call for help.

4.) I renewed my AAA membership back in September (I was wondering back in September if we should renew it, but I did!) We saved money on the towing fees! Whew!

5.) A friend we called to see if he could pick us up was available and came out to give us a ride home. He told us that he almost didn’t have his cell phone with him when we called. Double whew!

6.) My son had the chance to see a tow truck in action close-up (he loved it and said he wants to be a tow truck driver when he grows up :)).

7.) Our car had an appointment this week for the mechanic already (ironically for an oil change as well as an alignment), so we know he has the time to at least look at it soon.

8.) When no one was looking I wrote “TOW ME” on our dirty trunk while waiting for the tow truck. It felt good to make a little bit of fun at the situation.

Now, for the bad news:

1.) I don’t have a clue how much the repair will cost for this problem.

2.) It’s our only car.

As you can see, something went wrong, but many things did go right. I feel better after doing this, and appreciating the things that did go right in this situation. Perhaps when life throws you a curveball you can give this a try and really sit and think about the good things. There may be more good than bad.

Posted by Tricia on December 10, 2006 at 5:13 PM in General Debt, Insurance, Life Experiences | 17 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

Free Book - Navigating Your Health Care for Dummies

A little while ago, I was tipped off by City Girl’s Financial Blog that you could get a free book about health care. Free is good :)

So, I went to the site and signed up to receive Navigating Your Health Care for Dummies. At the worst I could get more junk mail and spam in my inbox. The site is run through Aetna, so I trusted it somewhat. So far, no new junk mail and no new spam.

I’ve skimmed through it, and the book is in the traditional form of all of the Dummies books (easy to read with a little bit of humor in there). It is a quick read and a very basic introduction to Health Care. It has 62 pages and is 8.5″ x 5.5″.

To get your free copy, just visit the Plan For Your Health website here.

Posted by Tricia on December 5, 2006 at 11:41 AM in Free Stuff, Insurance | 4 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

Woo Hoo! We Officially Have Health Insurance

As of the stroke of midnight, we officially have health insurance. I still have to pay the first bill, but our plan started today. After 5 years without, it is nice to have that piece of mind. What a great way to start the weekend :)

Posted by Tricia on December 1, 2006 at 7:01 AM in Insurance | 5 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

Very Nice News Was Received in the Mail Today

When we got home from shopping, my son got the mail from the mailbox and I saw the familiar logo of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan on a white envelope. That’s who we are getting our health insurance from.

My first thought was “Oh no” because they really processed our application quickly. They said it would take 4 to 6 weeks and it hasn’t been that long yet. It’s only been about two weeks since I mailed in the application.

Since Blue Cross/Blue Shield doesn’t really reject people, I wasn’t worried about it being a decline letter. I knew it was a bill. I opened the bill when we got in the house and my eyes scanned it so fast looking for the “Due Date.”

January 7, 2007

YES! I was so happy that I almost did a little dance. They were not utilizing auto pay for the first payment and I have until the new year to pay it! That is excellent news because we have a few more paychecks before the due date to have the money ready for it and we will not be as squeezed for cash.

While I tried not to worry about it too much, it was still a relief to now know when that bill was due. Sometimes, the unknown really bothers me since I am very much a planner type of person.

There was a little bit of bad news with the bill, though. The cost of the insurance per month was higher than what ehealthinsurance.com quoted me. Instead of around $330/month it is a little over $350/month. With looking at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan’s website…the price did go up since earlier this month. After my husband and I turn 30 early next year, we are looking at $400/month to cover the both of us.

I’m not going to focus on the negative which is the escalating costs of healthcare. I am going to focus on the positive that we will be able to pay this bill and when the time comes we will be able to pay future bills. As of December 1st, we now have health insurance after being without it since 2001. We now will have some peace of mind knowing that we will not be destroyed financially if something health-related should happen to one of us.

Next step is to finalize life insurance and look into disability insurance. Which, by the way, makingourway did a nice post on disability insurance not too long ago if you are interested.

Posted by Tricia on November 25, 2006 at 6:54 PM in Insurance | Comment First »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

Book Review: “Health Care on Less Than You Think” by Fred Brock

I was contacted by a public relations firm to give a review on Health Care on Less Than You Think: The New York Times Guide to Getting Affordable Coverage (amazon referral link) by Fred Brock. I received a copy of the book for free, but I am not receiving monetary compensation for this review. What I have to say about this book is my honest opinion.

With that said, here’s my thoughts…

The beginning of Health Care on Less Than You Think starts off with some sobering stories of individuals that have had their financial life rocked by medical costs. Even more surprising is the number of those people that HAD health insurance. Obtaining health insurance has been a priority of mine, but I have been dragging my feet with doing it. After reading what some of those people have paid for medical procedures - it really sunk in that one problem could easily rack up over $5,000 in medical bills. Needless to say, my application is in process as I announced yesterday.

Reading further, Mr. Brock details exactly how much extra an uninsured person has to pay for the same services that an insured person receives. I knew that happened, and feel that it is VERY unfair to charge those without health insurance a different price. I just didn’t know how much more. Can you believe that an uninsured person would have to pay a bill of $30,000 when an insured person (and their insurance company) would be paying $7,000?

Mr. Brock gives great advice on how to try to save money if you are uninsured, such as negotiating and auditing your medical care bills. He also explains those big words you find associated with health insurance policies. Finally, I really understand how coinsurance, deductible and out of pocket maximums work!

I’ve also finally learned about Health Savings Accounts (HSA’s). An entire chapter is decidated to helping the reader understand how they work and how they can be very advantageous or disadvantageous. After reading that chapter, I quickly looked up available HSA plans on ehealthinsurance.com. Unfortunately, none of them covered pregnancy and all of them required medical records. At this time, I feel confident saying that a HSA plan is not for us.

Overall, this book made me feel like a confident shopper when it came to finally choosing a plan for our family. I also feel more confident knowing some things that I can do to help save money when it comes to health care and prescription drugs. Knowing what I know now, I feel that Health Care on Less Than You Think (amazon referral link) will end up saving us money in the future.

Just a note, some things I did already know about - such as asking for an itemized hospital bill and checking for any mistakes. There will probaby be some things you may have heard about in this book as well. But, if you are fairly new to how health insurance works and want to learn more, this is an easy-to-read and understand book. I particulary enjoyed the real-life examples that Mr. Brock detailed throughout the book.

To conclude, this book was very helpful to me since our health care was a big decision I was facing. I am glad I was given the opportunity to read it.

Posted by Tricia on November 6, 2006 at 10:12 AM in Book Reviews, Insurance | 5 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

Health Insurance, Here We Come!

Yesterday, I spent a great deal of time comparing individual health insurance plans. A great place to find plans that are available in your state is ehealthinsurance.com. I was able to see many different policies, and then choose some to compare side by side.

I have looked at that site many times before, but I was never very confident with choosing a single plan. There’s the matter of coinsurance, deductibles, lifetime maximums….it was very overwhelming. Since we do not have employer sponsored health insurance, we have the ability to pick a plan from many different companies. That can be overwhelming as well.

There’s a book that really helped me gain some confidence with my decision, and I’ll have a review for that probably tomorrow. But I just couldn’t wait to share the news with everyone that a decision has been made and the first application has been submitted (especially since there are some out there who have been waiting for us to get health insurance ;)).

We decided to go with the only plan available that had maternity benefits. There may or may not be an addition to our family in the future - but we want to be prepared and covered in the event that we decide to add to our family. The insurance is also a very trusted company in our family - Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. Back in the day, we had an employer-sponsored Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan policy and we never had a problem with them.

The plan we are applying for has no dedictible and it has 30% coinsurance. What that means is that we will have to pay 30% of all services up to our out-of-pocket yearly maximum, which is $2,500 for an individual / $5,000 for the family. After hearing a few stories of what some relatively simple procedures can cost - having to pay up to $5,000 isn’t that bad.

An individual plan does come with a hefty price. Until we receive the official application in the mail to sign and remit with 2-month’s payment (the next step), we will not know the exact price. Right now, we just did a pre-application. Since health insurance policy prices change often, who knows exactly what it will be. The price quoted by ehealthinsurance.com was around $330/month. That will run about $4,000/year.

Another reason we decided to go with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan is that they do not require medical records and they have an unlimited lifetime benefit.

For us, at this point in our lives, I feel confident that this policy is the best one for our family. I will try to review our policy at least yearly and see if any other policies arise that would be better suited for us. Perhaps we can go with a cheaper policy.

Posted by Tricia on November 5, 2006 at 3:39 PM in Insurance | 4 Comments »
You can leave a response or trackback from your site. |

« Newer Archives Older Archives »

About This Site

Credit Card Debt

Savings Account

Note: This is the end of the usable page. The image(s) below are preloaded for performance only.

Offset header image Offset header image