Georgia seniors beware of the bait and switch tactic for Medicare supplement plans. Are you really getting what you were told or is the plan something else?
A lady I have been working with for several months had numerous questions about Medicare plans. options, carriers and so forth. I patientely took the time to answer each of her questions in writing and always confirmed that I had addressed and answered her questions.
When it appeared she had made her decision, I gave her an application to complete and offered to assist in any way.
Many of my clients are in remote parts of the state and she was over 100 miles away. Thanks to the internet and, with some carriers at least, the electronic application, it is not necessary for me to drive to meet clients and they don’t have to clean up their house for “company”, nor bake cookies.
The Blue Cross application can be confusing and their process is more challenging that other carriers. They insist on a paper application which is an inconvenience but I offer them none the less.
She picked the Blue Cross plan over my recommendation even though it was more expensive than the plan I suggested. I tell everyone you don’t get more when you pay more, it simply means you paid too much.
Even though her initial motivation was to save money she apparently decided she would rather have the Blue Cross name which is fine with me.
A few days went by and I followed up to see if she was stumped or had simply forgotten about the application. I was surprised to hear she had applied direct to Blue Cross because they had quoted her a “much lower rate”.
This is not possible.
The rates on the Blue Cross website are the same whether you use an agent or not. Same is true if you use a “local” Blue Cross captive agent or call the company direct.
Of course if you call the company it is no different from any other Medigap carrier. You may get accurate information or not.
In this case I don’t believe she got the truth.
She had asked for, and was quoted, a plan F supplement plan. There is no way she could have been given a much lower rate unless someone pulled a fast one and quoted high F which is about 70% less the “regular” F.
The reason for the savings is that high F does not pay for anything until you have satisfied a $2,000 deductible.
Even saving $100 per month (which is the approximate difference in regular F and high F) you don’t save enough to make up the difference in most cases. Saving $1200 to incur $2000 additional out of pocket expenses is not a good decision.
In her case in particular, she has some rather high, ongoing medical expenses that will quickly eat up the savings.
At this point it did not matter since she had decided my advice was not credible given that my quoted rate was almost 3x higher than the rate she had from the “other” Blue Cross rep.
There are ways to save money and avoid overpaying for Medicare supplement plans but this isn’t one of them. Don’t be fooled by what seems to be a much better offer.
Georgia Medicare Plans has the best rates in the state for Medicare supplement plans.
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