Hello folks,

I'm on the verge of signing a permanent contract which of course will also require me to sign up for health insurance. My manager has given me a breakdown of the costs and at first glance it appeard that Debs and I could both be covered for medical and dental for around $40 a week for the two of us. However, I was told today that the company I work for has this weird (well it seems weird to me) rules that if the spouse of an employee has their own insurance already, a $250 a month 'penalty charge' will be added to the cost of the insurance if hat employee adds their spouse to the company insurance. The flip side is that if an employee opts to get their insurance cover elsewhere, that employee will be credited an extra $250 each month !!

I'm just wondering if this is a common practice or if this is unusual ?? The way things currently stand, Debs receives money from her school because she opted out of the schools insurance. That amount will cover about 90% of the cost of both her insurance and most of mine as long as she sticks with her current plan and I take out employee insurance just for myself. If I added Debs to my new insurance we'd be out of pocket by quite a significant amount.

What a screwy system !!

Mark

I never heard of such a thing. Better investigate me, that sounds crazy

I've seen this -- my husband's insurance had different (higher) premium amount for the situation when the non-employee spouse has insurance or *can* get insurance from another employer. The difference was quite a bit, don't remember how much.

Work out what combination works best for you money-wise.

Never heard of that either. My company bases what they take out of my check based solely on how many people are on my plan. My ex husband kept his employer's medical insurance, but I added him to my dental insurance. The charge for my medical stayed the same, and my dental increased only to pick him up.

I've not heard of it but it doesn't really surprise me. Employers are doing all sorts of stuff these days to keep the premiums down.

I have heard of plans that won't kick in until the other policy has covered first. In other words, your insurance wouldn't pay for any of Debs expenses until her insurance had done their part. Logic being that she is the primary insured on her policy and therefore that company should be the one to pay first. Then your policy would kick in for the balance (or most of it).

At least they give you some back in your check if you don't use the coverage. That's a definite plus.

Mark, I just thought of something else.....

Check the differences in the two plans to see which gives your family better coverage - yours or Debs. Oftentimes there is a vast difference in the deductibles, amount of expense covered (90/10 vs. 80/20), etc.

In this state the teacher's insurance coverage is excellent - most of us regular citizens wish we had health insurance that good. And their pension plan can't be beat either. Might not be the same for you - here teachers are on the same plan as state government workers.

I agree that it seems a pretty recent trend. It seems that the companies want to encourage employers to only ensure themselves or opt out of the plan altogether. For example, my current employer would cover me for free, but if I want to add my husband than I have to pay 50% of his premium ($150/month).

I interviewed for a job recently where it would have been $342 out of my pocket to add the family......

Ouch Becca! Well, sounds as if I'm coming out pretty good to add Joel. For us to have family coverage (school employee here) will cost about $175 a month. When he gets a job, we'll re-evaluate the insurance thing. We might find that my insurance is better...who knows.

I guess I have been spoiled all these years because I never had to worry about any penalties for both spouses having insurance

Becca, OUCH!! That just sucks! I know to add Chas, it will be an extra $70 a month for my insurance. I think where they really start draining you is when you do the 'family' thing and add a child. That is when it gets pricey.

Interestingly enough, 'family' seems to mean any number of people within most group plans. From what I have learned, it doesn't matter if there is 2 or 10 of you - the amount charged is the same. BUT they can impose per-person deductibles.......

Obviously, there's a wide difference is what you might pay at your job versus what a person employed elsewhere pays. But usually that has more to do with company policy than anything else. Obviously, different insurance companies charge different rates, so that is of course one factor. Also, the larger the group, the lower the premiums. Factor in that overage for just the employee is MUCH lower than insuring the family - in most cases $300 or $400 difference!

Most employers will pay a portion of family coverage, but not all. They set that by internal policy.

In the case of the job I interviewed for, they paid the entire premium for the employee. But they paid nothing for family. Hence, if you wanted family coverage, you had to pick up the ENTIRE cost.

Hmm, really? My employer has one rate for singles, one for employee plus one, and one for 'families'.

Well it sure is possible! Creativity in Benefits!! Most of the ones around here don't differentiate.

I just wonder what Mark decided to do.........

Hello Folks,

Thanks for all the feedback. I think Debs and I have decided to opt out of the company insurance which will then result in me receiving an extra $250 a month to fund my own. Combining that with the money that Debs receives from her school district to do the same thing, we should have more than enough to pay for insurance for both of us.

With regard to the different amounts charged for insurance, yes my employer has 3 different rates, Employee only, employee +1 and family. However, the kicker is the extra $250 a month they add to any weekly premium if the spouse of an employee who is eligible for insurance through their own employer chooses to be added to the insurance through this employer. If Debs wasn't offered insurance through her school district then we wouldn't be hit with the extra charge. Because she is, we would be, and therefore it makes more sense to opt out and find our own.

Also... i'm not eligible for insurance through my employer for 60 days after I start (which will be Monday). Opting out means that in theory there is nothing stopping me getting my own insurance starting this weekend so that there is no break in my coverage. Yeah I'll be paying the first couple of months out of my own pocket but we can cope with that.

I'll keep you posted on what who we wend up going with.

Mark

I'm confused. Will you be added to Debs' insurance, or do you have to find other coverage for you?

I'd be surprised if Debs' insurance wouldn't let her add you to it.

Sorry for the confusion,

We'll probably shop around. She currently opts out of her School districts insurance and gets her own from a private firm using an allowance she is paid by the school district. If me being added to the same insurance is cheapest then we'll do that, otherwise I may go for insurance through a different company or we may both sign up with someone new.

I was given a link to ehealthinsurance.com which seems to have a pretty comprehensive list of providers and their individual coverage summarys. We'll probably just sit down one night and try and work out what the best option for us will be. After looking breifly the other day I don't think it would unreasonable to think I could get us both insured for around $300 a month.

Mark

Ah, thanks for clarifying. You probably explained it earlier, and I either didn't read it right or forgot.

Either way, it sounds like you're good to go!

For Fiscal year 06

It's a new trend by the companies nowaday to shift premium cost. AT work the difference was only a $25/a month extra if you want coverage for your spouse if she/he can receive coverage from their own employer. Before we used to have what is like a double benefit so the other party would pay the copayment, or at time you just keep one.

Just one more way for the company to save money and Squeeze should i say shifting cost to their employees.

The employers try as much to contain cost, that's why we have so much offshoring, outsourcing, when the INSURANCE COMPANIES are raising the health insurance premium so much to HIKE UP THEIR PROFIT.
The CEO of UnitedHealthGroup came under fire from the shareholder because he got almost $1billion in Severance packgages, bonus, stock options at time when everybody is crying because of Health care cost.
We need a National Health Care System, but with $1billion dollar going to one person, and many more health care companies PAYING OFF POLITICIANS, lobbyist, It's only a dream, it will never Happen.

National Health Insurance is so desperately needed here. It's a crying shame a nation that is one of the worlds leader's in health care has such a large percentage of the population unable to afford to go to the doctor, let alone the hospital.

My husband still can't quite wrap his brain around the fact that a hospitalization could bankrupt us.

Mark, if you find a company that can insure you and Debs for $300 a month, please post it here. You'd be doing the community a big service - not that you haven't done many already!

I guess that all depends on how its managed. Personally it scares the s*** out of me to think about our govt. controlling our healthcare across the board. I realize our system has problems but I've not seen overwhelming evidence that the UK system is the way to go. Its got some big time problems. Dunno much about Canada's system (other than Keifer Sutherland's grandfather - I think it was grandfather! - came up with it) but maybe theirs is better.

Still, it'd be great to find some kind of compromise between our system and theirs.