***nykola***

applecider

You said you found your own health care and it wasn't as expensive as you thought?

So tell me about it.  What company?  How'd you go about finding it?

Healthcare is one of the main things keeping DH at his job.  Right now we can get healthcare through school, but there could be a gap of unknown length after I graduate next year if I can't get a job right away.

babyaustin725

Butting in.  I'd like to know as well.  James's insurance runs out pretty quick and we are going to have to do something to make sure the boy is insured.

noisy_penguin

Healthcare is one of the main things keeping DH at his job. 

This. Except me, not Lorne.

Jas*sGirl

Butting in too!  You can get an individual plan for you and your family.  Go to https://www.regence.com/index.jsp and look at the plans.  They should also have rates for you.  If for some reason you cant sign up on your own let me know and you can do it through my office.  We did not use cobra because it would be like $700 a month, but our individual plan is only $220 a month for all 3 of us!

nykola

Yes ma'am!!  So the first thing I did was go through an online healthcare broker.  Something like ehealthinsurance.com or something like that.  I can't remember which one I used, but I'll look it up for you.

Basically it will ask you who you are, how many people need to be insured, etc....and will usually connect you with a local, Seattle area broker.  I worked with Robert Mori at Benefits NW (https://www.benefitsnw.com/) You could just skip all the hassle and contact him if you want..lol

Basically, after finding out my needs, he sent me this huge package in the mail and via email with info from about 4-5 major healthcare companies that service our area.  For each of those companies, there are about 6-10 plans, but it's laid out in matrixes so it's really easy to understand.

For me, the type of maternity coverage I wanted was the big deciding factor.  I ended up going with Group Health's Alliant Plus plan which allows me to use in-network or out of network docs with no diff. in percentage I pay/out of pocket expenses.  Incidentally, DH and I have the same health plan, except his is through his company so he pays a bit less per month for it AND has a lower deductible.

The big thing with buying your own health insurance is the deductable.  Most company-sponsored health plans either don't have a deductible, or it's so low, it's not even noticeable.

I think of all the 30is plans I looked at, they all had some sort of deductible required at some point ranging from ($500-$3000 depending on the plan).  The big thing to look for though is WHEN you have to pay that deductable. So many plans cover all preventative care/well visits, prescriptions, check-ups, ER even, etc. without you having to pay any type of deductible.  With those plans, you usually only have to pay the deductible IF you're actually admitted to the hospital for some reason. If you or DH is healthy, this generally doesn't happen.  My good friend who hipped me to buying health insurance has done it for 4 years, with 3 kids and no one in her family has been admitted to the hospital yet.

Usually higher deductible means you'll pay less monthly.  Lower deductible means you'll pay more monthly.  But if you whip your calculator out, you can figure out what works for you.  Of the plans I looked at, monthly costs ranged from $75 - $250. And that was for maternity coverage too. For totally healthy people, especially infants, it's pretty darn cheap.

Sorry this seems really long. I'm happy to answer more questions, etc.  Just ask away.  This really ended up being a good solution for me.  It would have cost more for me to be added as a dependent on DH's company plan.  Sure I pay more per month than I'm used to ( I think at all my previous companies I paid something like <$30 a month for my health insurance), but it's cheaper than COBRA and WAY more affordable than I ever thought.  The first thing I thought was, "I should've quit my job a long time ago!!" LOL

nykola

Jas*sGirl:

Butting in too!  You can get an individual plan for you and your family.  Go to https://www.regence.com/index.jsp and look at the plans.  They should also have rates for you.  If for some reason you cant sign up on your own let me know and you can do it through my office.  We did not use cobra because it would be like $700 a month, but our individual plan is only $220 a month for all 3 of us!

Yeah $220 for 3 healthy peeps sounds about right.  Regence was one of the ones I was considering.  There's only about 5-6 companies that will do individual plans for WA: Regence, Group Health, LifeWise, and one more I can't remember.

And yes, Cobra is RIDICULOUS. The only way I'd ever spring for Cobra is if I formerly worked for MSFT. Their health insurance is the best in the land. lol

nykola

Oh one more thing...as Tammi said, you can usually apply for many plans directly through their websites.  Read up on as many as you can first though because once you get to the "apply" stage, they usually ask you for billing info so that once they approve you, they can charge you :-)

Also, as Tammi said, sometimes (not always) you may have to go through a broker or another company when applying because I think somebody has to get the commission :-)

preston18

butting in too...

another thing to consider in additon to the deductible is Rx limits.  Most plans I looked into have a $3000/yr limit.  I do over $1k a month so I COBRA. COBRA is only expensive if your employer plan was expensive--there is no change in coverage OR premium.

DS is on his own Regence plan (totally threw the receptionist at the ENT yesterday. She's never had a kid as subscriber before) and DH is on another. It's a pita to keep track of three plans* but we save so much.

 

*four if you count the dog's insurance