Every few years, anyone with a Medicare Supplement insurance plan should review their policy to see if they could lower their premium while maintaining the same benefits that they currently have. In fact, it’s often easier than you think to save money AND get the same coverage as your existing plan. How is this possible?
A Little Known Fact about Medicare Supplement Plans and Their Premiums
As premiums rise, existing Medicare Supplement plans will lose a percentage of their plan participants to other plans offering lower rates. Those that leave are healthy and incur fewer claims. When they leave the plan, the remaining less healthy participants with higher claims experience will cause premiums to rise much faster compared to some other plans. Increases of 15% per year or more are common, whereas newer plans may experience increases of less than half of that amount. The result is that those in older plans may be paying premiums that are far higher than they can receive elsewhere.
Consider this example – Jane purchased her Medicare Supplement policy three years ago when she turned 65 and went on Original Medicare paying $130 per month. In that time, she has had three increases on her premium:
| Year 1 increase: 9% to $142/month
Year 2 increase: 19% to $169/month Year 3 Increase: 18% to $199/month |
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With these increases, Jane is now paying $199 per month. That’s an increase of over 50% in three years! What’s more, Jane’s husband, Dan, has seen similar increases in premium and now pays $211 per month. By shopping around and choosing a plan from another company, they could pay $135 and $148 per month, respectively, for THE SAME COVERAGE.
Today, Jane and Dan pay a combined $400 per month for their insurance; shopping around would lower their premiums to $283 per month… a savings of over $1400 per year! Federal and State law mandate that “any standardized Medigap policy is guaranteed renewable even if you have health problems.” This means the insurance company can’t cancel your Medigap policy as long as you pay the premium.
Call today for a no obligation cost-comparison from an Medicare Supplement specialist at (800) 535-3304 or click here to submit our online quotation form.