Full-timing and health insurance

[joycem]

Just a word to the wise. I was at a rally and the discussion was on changing state residency. One of the things that came up was health insurance. The speaker said they had checked with their insurance company to make sure they would be covered in their new state and was told yes. What they were not told was that eventhough the company did business there they would be considered a new customer because each state has their own rules. As a new insured in that state the company would not cover any pre-existing condition. This resulted in a huge expense for them as the wife was a cancer survivor.

[tbutler]

This is why we maintain an address in our original home state. We visit the physicians and dentists, etc. that we did for the many years we were working because it is the only practical way to keep the health insurance under our employer. It is the one area where we are bending our rule to be completely attached to our home state. We have three more years before reaching Medicare which I believe will take care of our problem. Meanwhile, the phrase, "Don't ask, don't tell" is good advice for health care when going full time.

Insurance companies are forced by different state laws to compartmentalize themselves into separate entities. For two years after retirement we worked for a company in Illinois while residing in Missouri. We had to maintain our policies with the employer we retired from as well as the policy with the new company. They were both United Health Care but we couldn't arrange any way to combine the two so we were paying double insurance to the same company! If we had dropped the policy of our retirement company, then when we left the Illinois employer we would have lost all insurance and been on the market as individuals. It is maddening!

This is just one reason I am hoping that the President is successful in his bid to make health care universal in this great country. The fractured health care system we have now only works for a few. We need a system that will include everyone, not just the fortunate.