Alright, it's now now's your chance
to get healthcare for next year.
Open enrollment for the Affordable Care Act.
Marketplace Health Care
plans is going on right now.
So is Medicare enrollment.
We know that you have questions,
and we have experts to help
you navigate the process.
Catherine CVA is with AARP of North Carolina.
Morgan Campbell is with alliance
insurance services and Laura
Packard is with get America covered.
They're all here to answer your questions.
This is how you get your
questions to our experts.
The number is
336-379-5775.
These are text only questions.
Please don't call,
but please do text in your question.
Alright, first and foremost,
let's just go over the fact that the
enrollment is open for ACA and Medicare.
I think we've got a calendar that we
can put up so that we can show those
dates and make sure that everyone
knows that it's open right now.
But there are end dates to this.
So for Medicare Catherine,
when can they enroll until?
Till December 7th alright so
you got until December 7th to
do that HealthCare.gov there's
actually two deadlines there.
Laura, let's tackle the first one.
Well, if you want coverage on January 1st,
you need to sign up by December 15th,
but you have until January
15th to sign up for next year.
It just won't start right away.
All right. Let's put that calendar up
as well. 'cause we have a calendar
that shows those two deadlines
for HealthCare.gov and that is so
that you can be very clear on when
you want your coverage to start.
So if you sign up by December the 15th,
that's the number one.
That means that you are going to
have coverage starting January 1st,
but if you don't sign up until.
January 15th you were not going
to have coverage until February.
Right now that we've got all that going on.
Morgan, let's talk about how this year.
There are a whole lot more
providers out there.
Yes, so we have had a lot of new
carriers come into North Carolina,
some in different counties,
so it's not the typical just
Blue Cross and Blue Shield.
We have United Healthcare.
We have signal we have ambetter we
have Friday and I'm sure there's
some more that I'm leaving now.
What I would caution you for is when
you're looking at your application
on healthcare.gov and you have
all of your plan selections,
please check your network
if you are a novant person.
And that's where you like to go,
and you enroll in a plan that they
do not have nobody in their network.
You're not going to be satisfied
with that claim.
Please double check your your networks so
when we go onto the marketplace,
maybe you can kind of walk
us through that and we're
looking at the different plans.
Does it list it right
there so that will know?
Yes, so when you finally complete your
application in your the final phase where
you complete where you select your plans,
you may be a little bit overwhelmed.
There are some counties that have up to 84
different plans for you to choose from.
Pay attention to the deductibles,
the copays, and there is a nifty little
button there that you can click and you
can check it will route you over to the
carriers website where you can look up
each individual doctor that you go to
right, and that sounds like an
arduous type of task, right? It does,
but you don't want to pick the wrong one.
Otherwise you're going to be really upset
if you can't go see your regular doctor.
OK, so a lot of the plans you
might be overwhelmed and thinking.
Oh my gosh. There's no way I'm
going to be able to afford these,
but Laura, you had a stat the other
day that talked about the amount of
plans that were really affordable.
Yes, according to Sims 4 out
of five people can find a
plan for $10 or less a month.
So even if you've looked in the
past and it's been too expensive
thanks to the American rescue plan,
it's cheaper than ever.
So definitely go to HealthCare.gov and check
out your options.
Alright, so with that said,
this person just texted and said
I've done the Affordable Care Act
three times this year and last.
I live in Guilford County,
but it's only giving me options
of paying $700 and I'm unemployed.
So can we give any thoughts on that
of what they should be doing and maybe
where they should be looking instead?
If that person was in their application and
they did not select the income correctly
and they did not list like if they got
unemployment or what they had made.
If they had worked throughout the year,
that could throw off the application
and then there's this one tiny question
that a lot of people seem to skip.
Does your employer offer health coverage?
Some people do not read that question
and they automatically check that
box when you check that box it
throws off your entire application.
You do not get a tax. Credit
haha OK so there is a box that says
does your employer offer healthcare
and you have to either check yes or no.
Correct, OK, make sure you are doing that.
All right. We have a couple
of Medicare questions here.
First and foremost, Catherine,
this person is asking is the
Medicare cash card for $2800 real?
I'm thinking that that does not sound right.
That does not sound right. OK,
so that sounds like some kind of scam
that someone is trying to tell you
that there is something out there that
that's a thing and that is not a thing.
OK, this person is asking.
I turned 65 in August.
Do I enroll now or do I wait until
the six months before I turn 65?
You have to wait until three months
before your birthday to enroll.
You have three months before the month of
your birthday and three months afterwards.
So back it up from there and
put it on your calendar.
But in the meantime,
start thinking about how and what kind
of supplemental policies you might need.
In addition to that.
Supplemental policies like.
Like for prescription drug prices
for the parts of Medicare that
are not covered by Medicare,
per say that 20%,
that is not covered by them so.
Go ahead, I'm sorry,
either, uh, if you're still employed
there are several options that way,
but if you're not, you need to start
exploring that so that you can get those
answers as you get ready to enroll,
right? And every time we get
to the Medicare question,
let's talk about Part B.
What do you have to do, Morgan?
You need to enroll in Part B.
If you do not have credible coverage
deemed through your HR that it is good
as or better than Medicare coverage.
OK, so you do have to apply for it and
then you can say I'm going to wait on it.
You can waive it. Yes, OK,
but you have to apply for
it then because if you don't
you will be paying a penalty
for the rest of your Life OK,
we've got lots of text questions.
We're coming back.
We're taking a quick break.
We'll be right back.