Review your Medicare options – it could save you a bundle

by Rob Howard
Associate Editor

Here we are at Medicare ‘Open Enrollment.’ Starting October 15 and continuing through December 7, all people with Medicare can change their health plan and prescription drug coverage for 2017. If you don’t do anything, the plan you have will simply continue. But that might be a bad idea.

Medicare Parts A and B can help out with your hospital and medical costs. Part D helps with your prescription drugs. Supplement policies are available to cover the rest. When I started on Medicare, I chose both a supplement policy and Part D, along with Parts A and B; my annual cost was $3,500.

After a couple of years of that, I decided to use the open enrollment period to explore my options and try to get my costs down. And that led me to Medicare Part C, called Medicare Advantage plans. For both medical and drug coverage, you pay your $104.80 Part B premium and either no additional premium, or a small one.

The only caveat to this option is you will have copays. I have to pay $5 to see my primary physician, $40 for a specialist. If I have to have a medical procedure, it usually costs me around $125. But if you are in reasonably good health, if you switch to a Medicare Advantage plan you can save a substantial amount of money. In my case, I saved almost $2,300 a year.

To see if a different plan is right for you, log on to Medicare.gov to search for plans, or call 1-800-MEDICARE. Questions to ask yourself are:

• Does the plan allow you to see your current doctors and go to your favorite hospital? The plan website usually has a provider directory where you can find this information.
• What kind of co-pays does the plan require?
• What other things does the plan provide? Many offer plans like ‘Silver Sneakers’ that give you a free fitness center membership. This is an important benefit, since an active senior is a healthier senior, and gym memberships often cost as much as $500 a year.

You can save a substantial amount of money. You have until December 7.

The Gayly – September 11, 2016 @ 2:25 p.m.