Before you buy Medicare supplement insurance there are a few facts you should be armed with in order to get the best choice possible. This type of insurance is very helpful to seniors but lack of understanding of how it is structured can cost you money in the long run. If armed with the facts, you should be able to choose a policy that suits you without adding unnecessary cost.
Policy premiums for this type of gap insurance will be in addition to whatever you are paying now for Medicare. You need to already have Medicare Part A and Medicare Part B before you can get a gap policy. For this reason, supplemental insurance like this is called Medigap because it covers whatever is not covered by your Medicare Parts.
If you are married and your spouse needs coverage as well, you will have to get a policy for each of you. Some people mistakenly believe that they are purchasing a policy which will also cover their wife or husband, but these policies are intended for individuals.
Medigap policies are divided into Plans A-L, and each plan provides a different level of coverage. However, what each plan provides is standard across the board for all insurance companies. In other words, company number one's plan B will be the same as the plan B that company number two provides.
What may be different, however is the price. The insurance companies are allowed to charge whatever they want for any individual plan. For this reason, you should definitely get several quotes in order to assure you are getting the best price. Also, the companies do not have to sell all twelve plans, so if you are being steered towards one in particular you may want to check with another company to see if a different plan might suit you better.
Do not purchase Medigap insurance hoping that it will cover your prescription costs because it will not. Medicare now makes prescription coverage available to all users so if you do not have this coverage in place, you need to get it through Medicare, not gap insurance. The Medicare website has instructions on how to rectify this issue.
US law governs the selling practices of insurance policies, and there are restrictions in place regarding Medicare supplement insurance. One example is that it is illegal to sell any individual more than one gap insurance policy because only one is necessary and they are the same benefits no matter which company you buy from. Do not try to purchase more than one supplemental insurance policy for Medicare, because it is totally unnecessary.
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