Your Insurance … with Michele Campbell – Is a group plan right for your business?

Published in the April 18 – May 1, 2018 issue of Gilroy Life

Michele Campbell

If you own a Gilroy business, have you looked into a group plan? If you own a small business and you currently purchase individual insurance on your own, you might want to consider a group health plan. Yes, there are specific requirements to be able to offer group coverage, but unless you check into it, you’ll never know.

For starters, you must have two people on payroll. However, they both don’t need to take out the coverage.  If one of those employees has coverage elsewhere, say through a spouse or they’re on Medicare, that’s okay, they’re not counted against you.

It enables you to get coverage through a group plan for you and your family.  Group plans don’t have the stringent network restrictions like the individual market does, nor does it have the prescription drug restrictions that we’re seeing on the individual plans.

Basically, what we’re saying is that your choices of physicians is so much greater than if you’re not on a group plan. The individual market is riddled with problems with finding doctors and staying in network.

If you do have to use out-of-network doctors, the coverage has such high deductibles that if feels like you don’t have any coverage at all.

The rates on the group plans are pretty competitive with the individual market also, and often beats the rates for people 50 and older. If this is something you’d like to take a look at, give us a call and let’s see if you qualify, then we’ll run quotes for you.

 New to Medicare?

Are you turning 65 or just now retiring? You might be feeling a little overwhelmed if this is your first time looking at Medicare and how it works. There is a lot of information out there and can be very confusing when you’re first learning about it.

First you need to enroll in Medicare, a few months prior to turning 65, or if you’re collecting Social Security, you will be automatically enrolled and your card will be sent to you.

Once you get enrolled in the Medicare system, then you can purchase either a Medicare Advantage plan or a Medicare Supplement and a Part D prescription drug plan. If you’re not sure which way to get coverage, you can ask an insurance agent for help to guide you through this process.

Michele Campbell is the owner of Michele Campbell Insurance. She can be reached at (408) 848-2271 or email her at [email protected].