Consumer’s Health Insurance Blog

I think that there is a lot of confusion and misinformation about the process of buying health insurance. One common thought is that you are buying it on an annual basis, and need to wait until the end of the year or the “open season” to make changes. While that is true within employer group plans, it does not apply to those that buy individual health insurance, most individual purchases of an association group plan, or even in all situations with an employer.

For example, let’s say that you’ve purchased health insurance on your own. Perhaps you are an entrepreneur, an early retiree, a freelancer, or one of the many others who buy their own health insurance. If you decide that you want to switch insurers, in many cases, depending on state law, you can make the change any time of year. There may be restrictions from your current insurer if you just want to change plans with that insurer, and those restrictions may depend on the type of change that you want to make. For example, if you want to increase your deductible and reduce your monthly payments, you can typically do this quickly without any medical underwriting. Try to go the other way, and they’ll want to make sure that you haven’t just become sick and are trying to “game the system.”

For small business plans, if you want to change from one insurer to another, you’ll want to check to see if you are stuck with the insurer until the end of the contract year. If you are not, then you can change.

If you’re an employee taking health insurance, you can make changes whenever a qualifying event occurs. The changes that you can make may be fewer than the changes you make during the “open season,” but they may be helpful. Qualifying events include marriage, divorce, birth of a child, adoption, or death in the family.

Explore your options, and know that you can make changes more frequently than once a year.

Jonathan Pletzke is a consumer expert on health insurance and author of the health insurance book Get a Good Deal on Your Health Insurance Without Getting Ripped-Off, available online and at bookstores nationally. Additional details can be found at the consumers health insurance book and resources website www.BestHealthInsuranceBook.com. Copyright 2007-2008 Aji Publishing.

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