Archive for August, 2008

Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda – A Sad California Health Insurance Story

Friday, August 8th, 2008

Sometimes my clients like to elaborate about their own experiences with medical bills. This one I want to share. I was speaking with a man who said to me that he “Will never put his family threw what he went through as a child”. I expected the usual grew up poor and lived in the projects story, but this one was unique.

His family wasn’t rich, but they were not poor either. He had a stay at home mom and dad was a local business owner. His dad never thought that the need for health insurance was strong enough and never bought a policy for the family. One day his mother became ill. It was cancer. Without insurance the bills started piling up. Mom made it, but the price was much more than just the bills from treatment. He explained to that his dads business suffered greatly because of this unexpected expense. It took years to get back into the position he was in financially. Now here’s the kicker. Not only did the mom suffer a tragic illness, she blamed herself for putting the whole family in that position.

Now he sees not only that the health insurance helps pay medical bills and help keep him financially stable, it will also prevent any one of his family members from feeling bad and becoming depressed if they are stricken with a serious illness. As a young boy he wanted help, but didn’t know how. He doesn’t want his boy to grow up with that feeling.

Having health insurance is all about planning ahead. We never know when or how we are going to become sick or be in an accident. My client is smart for planning ahead. He knows that now his family is insurable and that at any time, any one person in his family may become uninsurable. He’s aware that once an illness is diagnosed, you can consider yourself either uninsurable or paying a higher premium on your health insurance.

My client’s father could have avoided all the grief and self blaming by insuring his family with a California health insurance plan. They could afford it but chose to take the risk. There are hundreds of California health insurance plans to choose from and I’m sure you can find one that fits your budget. Finding a plan is easy with websites like www.MattsInsurance4CA.com where you can compare health plans from several top rated carriers. They even make it easy to apply.


Tips To Reduce Your Health Insurance Premium

Tuesday, August 5th, 2008

The cost of health insurance is can be high and California health insurance is no exception. Everybody needs to have a good health plan with a reputable carrier. Yes, I do understand the concern about the high cost of health insurances. It’s necessary to have health insurance and at the same time you should make your plan choice sensibly so that you don’t pay too much for unnecessary coverage. Here are few tips which will help you in reducing the amount of your health insurance premium. Think about the last three or four years and how many times you have visited a doctor. If you haven’t gone to the doctor much and you have a plan with a co-pay, you may not need that particular plan. Having a co-pay included in your health plan cost more money than a plan that has either a limited number of visits with a co-pay or no co-pay at all. Most of us generally enjoy good health except for few times a year when we suffer from some minor health issues. If you’re fairly healthy, you can go for a high deductible health plan and save money. I too followed this advice. Now I am saving a considerable amount on the health insurance premium. I was paying for unnecessary benefits earlier. You can get quotes from more than two or three health insurance companies and judge for yourself based on the quote and the coverage that you get. Many of us are generally healthy, we can avoid inclusion of all the coverage but only opt to go with catastrophic coverage which might be required if you have a big claim. Other benefits like physician’s visit, prescription, etc. can be avoided as these extras raise the premium further. Sometimes group health insurance can be more expensive than if you have an individual family plan. Contrary to popular belief that employers offering health insurance must go with a group policy, they don’t. Group policies are guarantee issue for any eligible employee who wants it. That means that no matter how sick or how many claims are filed, everybody gets accepted. With more claims being filed with group insurance, the insurance carrier must charge higher premiums. Individual plans on the other hand are fully underwritten. The insurance company will only accept healthy people onto the plan. There for less claims and lower premiums. These are just few things which would help us in reducing the health insurance premium. But there might be several of other similar points which when used intelligently would reduce the amount you pay. These are not theories or rules but just things which we learn out of experience. You too can share if you have any useful tip so that others can benefit. Why should we unnecessarily pay the insurance companies when we can we can prudently save on the premium and at the same time enjoy the needed health coverage.


Free Health Insurance Service That’s Often Overlooked

Saturday, August 2nd, 2008

Why are people not going to health insurance agents anymore? With the arrival of the internet, we’ve become a “Do it Yourself” nation. From home repairs to investing, we don’t want to be bothered with somebody telling us what we want. We know it all, because it’s here, on the internet, right. Well sometimes it’s wise to go ahead and get the advice of an expert. Especially when it comes to a complicated product like California Health Insurance. Until few years ago we relied on health insurance agents when we wanted to signup for our health insurance policy. We relied on their advice on the right policy to choose and for the additional riders that we chose. They are knowledgeable in this area and we did not have easy access to information on different types of policies and their costs. Most of us were comfortable operating that way because we did not have to do much except to sign on the application form and write the check. Today, that is not the case anymore; we don’t even have our insurance agent’s number in our contact list anymore. At the same time we have started searching for better deals on our health insurance policies. This is possible because we have learned to take advantage of the internet and the online services. We can get our health insurance quotes in a jiffy sitting in the comfort of our homes. We do not have to wait for our agent to give us the quotes and push the one carrier they prefer on us. There are number of good California health insurance quote comparison sites such as www.mattsinsurance4ca.com from which we can get quotes from all top rated insurance companies in just a few clicks. This service is available 24/7 and we can get the quote anytime and choose a plan we like at our leisure. And we can see all the quotes from every carrier and not only those that are advantageous to our insurance agent. This site also has a quote comparison tool that will allow us to compare a number of quotes side-by-side including their costs and benefits. Yes the internet has made us forget about our insurance agents. We all feel that we can do it our self and that way we will save money. Well, that’s not always true. It’s a good idea to use websites like www.mattsinsurance4ca.com to get an idea about how the plans work and how much the cost. But when you decide to buy, you may want to give the agent a quick call and ask “This is the plan I think I want, Will it work for me in my situation.” Many people make the wrong choice and either underinsure or buy a plan that’s too expensive for their situation. Bottom line, Get the free health insurance advice. Just ask your agent “Is this plan right for me?” The advice is free and it could save you big bucks.