Tess in the Burbs Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Dh starts a new job this week. Insurance starts in 60 days at the new month, so will be Jan 1st. They will reimburse Cobra, but can we skip having insurance for 2 months? Paying for Cobra for 2 months will be hard, maybe impossible. I know we are required to have insurance now, but how do they know if we don't for 2 months?? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ali in OR Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Is there any other option besides Cobra for covering 2 months? We personally wouldn't go without--just too much experience with things that go wrong. Kid with seizures and a shunt (shunt revision 5 years ago was over $40k I think), sister with leukemia--treatment costs over 1 million, several recent cancer cases among acquaintances in our town. Anything going wrong wipes you out if you don't have insurance. Is there such a thing as short term coverage with really high deductible? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monstermama Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 We just went through this. We decided to pay for it for the two months (DH's new employer also agreed to reimburse it and we didn't want to take the risk with me being pregnant), but from all the paperwork we received, it looked like we could sign up for it and then not pay until the very end of the coverage period. You should receive paperwork from the old job within about a week of termination with all of the dates laid out. In our case, we were able to sign up via a website and were able to get final pricing and payment dates from there. How soon will the new company reimburse you? Keep in mind, though, that COBRA will deny any claims until they've been paid (plus an additional 2 week-ish processing period), so you may have to pay out of pocket if any bills are due before then and then get reimbursed by COBRA. FWIW, I had to call DH's former company's COBRA administrator twice and actually had a surprisingly good experience with wait times and having them explain how the billing works. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pippen Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Is there any other option besides Cobra for covering 2 months? We personally wouldn't go without--just too much experience with things that go wrong. Kid with seizures and a shunt (shunt revision 5 years ago was over $40k I think), sister with leukemia--treatment costs over 1 million, several recent cancer cases among acquaintances in our town. Anything going wrong wipes you out if you don't have insurance. Is there such a thing as short term coverage with really high deductible? Another vote for not skipping insurance. You always think a major illness or accident happens to someone else. Until it happens to you. The first 3 weeks of leukemia treatment ran $350,000, and by the time 2 months had passed there was another $1.2 million added onto that. Additionally, some of the best treatment options would have not been available without sufficient insurance coverage. If there were no other options, I'd borrow the amount to pay for two months of health insurance. I would never go without. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KungFuPanda Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Since they reimburse, I'd find a way to juggle it. Nobody plans their emergency room visits. You can manage anything for two months. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idnib Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Once you elect COBRA you have 45 days to make a premium payment, which will be retroactive. At least elect now in case something happens. If there's an emergency during that 45-day period you'll find that it's cheaper to pay the COBRA premium and have the medical stuff covered. It will also buy you time to figure things out. Also check in with the new employer and ask if you can submit for reimbursement of the first month of COBRA before paying the second, rather than paying both up front and then submitting. If your DH has a receipt and fills out the reimbursement form I doubt it will be a problem to do them separately. Since it's going to be reimbursed, can you borrow the money from family? 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ottakee Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Often you.can play the wait and see game as you have so.many days to decide on cobra insurance. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lanny Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 A short term loan or an Advance from the new employer are possibilities. Since the new employer is going to reimburse, it would be (IMHO) extremely irresponsible to not have the temporary COBRA coverage until January 1st. The only people who are guaranteed not to have a serious illness, be diagnosed with a serious disease, or be in an accident, between now and January 1st, have already passed away. Your DH may be a little embarrassed to ask if they can Advance the reimbursement, but if it is a large company he won't be the first person to request that help, and it is better to have this coverage than to risk your family. GL to your DH in his new job! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmrich Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 It is not worth the risk. Get the insurance. One small health event could shatter your finances. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teachermom2834 Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 In a similar situation we got a short term policy from a place I believe was called Ehealthinsurance or something like that. I found it online as an alternative to the marketplace plan we had that was costing us way too much. It was a very high deductible (maybe $10000 per person). We thought it was worth the risk compared to the marketplace plan we had that wasn't very good anyway. In our case it was a 30 day policy and very inexpensive. It was the right choice for us in that situation. We didn't have any events in that month but in the following few months we had many unpredictable major expenses and luckily we had better coverage then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ktgrok Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Here is what we did. Please read your paperwork to make sure the same would work for you. We had 30 or 60 days, I forget which, but want to say 60 days, to apply for Cobra, according to our Cobra paperwork. At whatever point we applied, it would be retroactive to the date we were first eligible. We applied right before the 60 day cut off. Then, we had 30 days to make our first payment...if we made it after that coverage would be terminated, but if we made it any time in those first 30 days we were fine. So we waited till the end of the 30 days. By that time we had insurance through my husband's work, and didn't need the Cobra, so never paid for Cobra. Had we had a situaiton where we needed to make a claim during that 90 day period we would have, and paid for Cobra. But we didn't, so we saved all that money, but were never in danger of not having insurance if we needed it. If I remember correctly, we had one regular doctor's appt, but it was cheaper to pay for that visit out of pocket than the 3 months of Cobra premiums. Had we ended up with someone in the hosptial we obviously would have just paid the Cobra premiums. 10 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JFSinIL Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 We had to go without insurance once, and it was the scariest two months of our lives for hubby and myself. Thank goodness nothing major happened, but never again (PS you never know when someone will get in a car crash or delevop asthma etc etc.) ok, flat out have to ask, is it me or the boards but I am NOT getting any spellcheck help the last few days. This thread reminded me of almost 22 years ago when middle dd was born hubby had changed jobs, since my pregnancy was preexisting I had to be on COBRA. As soon as baby was born she was on hubby's insuance, and then so was I. Hospital almost had a fit figuring out who paid what. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sandragood1 Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 I broke my ankle, very badly, during the 1 WEEK between jobs. Elect the Cobra coverage. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScoutTN Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Get the Cobra, for sure. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjzimmer1 Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 Get the Cobra, I once tried to play the game of "can we go without for one month" because there had been a paperwork error and I was just too overwhelmed to get it fixed for one month. During that month my DS got injured with a possible concussion and back injuries, we ended up taking an ambulance because we were somewhere without a vehicle, add to that the ER visit, the MRI, the day stay in the hospital for observation. Yes I found the energy to get the paperwork fixed and get coverage reinstated. I won't play that game again. It was way too nerve wracking that on top of the injury wondering if I was going to have to pay for all of it out of pocket. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tess in the Burbs Posted October 19, 2015 Author Share Posted October 19, 2015 Ok, will wait to elect though until near the end and pay. Should have enough by then. If not, will call family to help. Thank you!! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hwin Posted October 19, 2015 Share Posted October 19, 2015 We skipped and had a broken bone. Paying out of pocket was still cheaper than COBRA. That's usually the case - although of course the worst case scenarios will wipe you out for years to come. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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