Benefits

[wagegoth]

Your car insurance company and/or the 18-wheeler's driver's insurance didn't pay for that?

With car accidents you have to submit a claim, they're only going to cover to the maximum on your insurance unless you sue or can collect from the other driver (if the other driver is at fault), and it can take weeks or months to be paid. If you have medical insurance, you can get coverage right away, then usually your medical company will contact your car insurance company for whatever payment they can collect.

Which means that you are out cash up front for your bills and at the mercy of your car insurer, unless you have medical coverage of your own or through your job.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

I'm about to scream over our health care choices for 2008 . . .

We just got our annual enrollment information today, as the period begins today and runs through November 30.

There's an interesting change this year: instead of sending people out to stores with forms for you to select what options you want, it's online through the Kitty website.

What am I ready to scream over? I'm already paying right at $50 every pay period (2 weeks) for the $200 deductible plan. It was only $100 deductible 3 years ago when I was first hired, then in 2006, it went up.

It's going up again . . . to $300 deductible for the SAME PRICE. Full time employees can choose between the $300 deductible PPO plan or the CDHP (Consumer Driven Health Plan.)

Now the CDHP I'm not familiar with . . . but I'm going to take a good look at it later tonight or tomorrow to see what it's about (this plan for individuals is roughly $35 every pay period.)

Not sure yet if I'll start putting money away for the healthcare spending account, but I'll read up on it first before I decide on that. I already know I need to go back to the orthopedic (neck and shoulder are buggy again and I need meds) and I need to have a physical (which I should have had in September, but haven't had a chance to do yet due to finances.)

Good news is we're finally getting an honest-to-goodness VISION PLAN This covers an exam every 12 months, lenses every 12 months and frames every 24 months. I only pay $20 for the exam, and frames are covered up to $100 (I pay 80% of the difference over $100.) If I want contacts, they'll cover a portion of that too.

Before, it was included with the medical and we had to pay for stuff up front, then submit it to the BS for reimbursement (and from what I heard, as I hadn't used it is that they barely reimburse for anything.) So this plan should be better. We're getting ID cards for this coverage, so all we have to do is locate a participating provider, give them the card and pay our part up front.

Which I plan to use as soon as I get my card come January. I might even get contacts this time . . .

[bean]

I don't pay for medical - it's covered by the company 100%. However, the deductible is $1100. On the other hand, they give you a debit card tied to a wellness account (only works for prescriptions, copays, dr visits, etc). Your first eligible year, you get $300 on it (adjusted to whenever you became eligible - I got $182 since that was in July). After that I think it's $1000/yr. I'm not sure if it rolls over every year.

Our medical doesn't cover mental health or substance abuse at all. If I paid for the medical (and didn't have the PWA debit card) I would rank it as sucktastic. I've been through treatment for alcoholism and depression in the past, it's EXPENSIVE. However, the PWA card will cover some of that if I wind up going through any of that again. A year ago employees in my region got a chance to vote on adding mental/substance coverage - if they'd added it, medical would have cost employees $10 per pay period. They wanted free insurance, can't say I blame them.

The vision insurance is decent - VSP handles it. I got a pair of glasses that were about $160 (including anti scratch coating), my out of pocket was $50. $10 copay for the dr visit, $10 copay for glasses, plus the excess (they cover up to $130 on glasses). I didn't have the debit card yet, it would have covered all of that. I pay $4.20 per check for vision insurance (biweekly).

I haven't had to use the dental yet, it's your typical Cigna DHMO. I also have short and long term disability. I think all told, I spend about $20 per check on benefits. I didn't get life insurance since I'm single and don't have kids or siblings.

I have a 401k account as well, though right now only 1% of each check goes toward it. I haven't enrolled in the employee stock purchase plan yet, I will after my next raise. I can get stock at 85% of value through it, but I have to keep it for 2 years. Or I can get it at 100% and turn around and sell it immediately, and we get discounted fees from ScottTrade. Stock purchases are automatically done once per quarter (pretty average for ESPP I think?)

I've thought about dropping vision, but it pays for new glasses and dr visits yearly instead of bi-yearly.

[Reyneth]

With car accidents you have to submit a claim, they're only going to cover to the maximum on your insurance unless you sue or can collect from the other driver (if the other driver is at fault), and it can take weeks or months to be paid.

I work for a car insurance company, in the collections department to collect money for people at fault in accidents who didn't have insurance. So I know how it works. I'm surprised that since the other driver was most likely at fault (rear-ending) and driving for work (vehicle being a semi) that that person's company's insurance didn't cover the balance of the bills. Or the poster's insurance didn't pay out and seek to be reimbursed by the other insurance (how it can be done when the other insurance is taking too long to accept liability or pay).

My company does its best to get things back to the way they were before the accident. If our driver was not at fault, we'll even return the deductible when we can (in my department it's not as often as we'd like). If someone has enough med coverage, they shouldn't be paying anything accident-related even if health insurance doesn't cover it.

[TNT]

I don't pay for medical - it's covered by the company 100%. However, the deductible is $1100. On the other hand, they give you a debit card tied to a wellness account (only works for prescriptions, copays, dr visits, etc). Your first eligible year, you get $300 on it (adjusted to whenever you became eligible - I got $182 since that was in July). After that I think it's $1000/yr. I'm not sure if it rolls over every year.

I have a 401k account as well, though right now only 1% of each check goes toward it. I haven't enrolled in the employee stock purchase plan yet, I will after my next raise. I can get stock at 85% of value through it, but I have to keep it for 2 years. Or I can get it at 100% and turn around and sell it immediately, and we get discounted fees from ScottTrade. Stock purchases are automatically done once per quarter (pretty average for ESPP I think?)

I've thought about dropping vision, but it pays for new glasses and dr visits yearly instead of bi-yearly.

The deductible doesn't sound bad for free insurance, considering the debit card they give you towards expenses. I don't have a deductible, but I pay $60 a month for it... which works out to $720 a year.

Our ESPP also gives a 15% discount... but we're able to sell it as soon as the quarterly distributions are made. There's some tax consequences to doing that, although it's my understanding that if the stock loses 15%, it may be better tax-wise to take the loss (unless you expect the stock to rise again). I use my ESPP as a savings account... the 15% is better than what the bank pays.

We have a choice of vision plans this year... I'm not sure which is better for me, since both pay the same amount for contact lenses. I wear glasses one evening a month these days, so the contact benefits are what's most important to me.

I had to take the maximum of everything, including life insurance, the first year. When you first start, pre-existing conditions don't count, but afterwards, you have to provide Evidence of Insurability. As I'm an overweight, smoking, bipolar with high-blood pressure and a bad family history, I had to take it when I could get it. The $11 a month I pay for $90,000 in life insurance is dirt cheap... if I tried to buy it privately, they'd just laugh at me.

I'm not thrilled with our dental plan, mostly because I need a lot of work done. I'm looking into the DHMO, but very few doctors in the area take it.