This might be fun! Talked to a friend last night. He got his renewal on his individual health plan. The rate will be $570/month in 2016. It was $180/month in 2015.
For 2015, I did the Choice Savings Plan with HSA. Basically the company deposits $1,000 into an HSA on my behalf on January 1, and then I pay the premium of $46.20 monthly, and then an additional $102.17 per paycheck to max out my HSA contributions. So basically I paid in: 12 x 46.20 = $554.40 in premiums 24 x $102.17 = $2,452.08 in contributions Total Cost = $3,006.48 I had 2 primary care doctor visits this year, 2 dermatologist, and one gastro specialist. Had various antibiotics, inhalers, and skin lotions prescribed, and 2 xrays. I checked my HSA just now and I had $646 in charges, with a balance of $2,597 left in my account. Although, I think I put maybe $250 on a normal credit card, so likely ~$900 in medical expenses for 2015. This is company, not exchanges, but my premiums actually went down for 2016. Last month's 2016 guide came out with the details. They are still depositing $1,000 into the HSA on your behalf and none of the deducts/copay amounts changed, but the premium dropped from $46.20 to $43.66.
Our ACA premiums went down about $200 as a couple but of course we got move from a PPO plan to an HMO plan, the implications of which I am not really sure about yet. I think my doctors will take it but if they don't I don't have any qualms about changing. Your doctor is only going to spend 7 minutes with you, it's not like you develop a personal relationship. I've gotten to where I just type up a couple of paragraphs about what I want to tell them and just hand it to them.
The main implication of the switch to HMO is that on most of the ones in Texas you won't be able to go to a reputable hospital.
I'm pretty sure I'll be able to keep my PPO. I haven't heard otherwise (not that I've been paying attention).
I'm pretty sure I can keep going to the VA for free and as long as I live in Houston, that won't be a bad deal.
Just now realized that. Heh. I know someone who works there, some supply chain job. Irregular hours but she likes it.
I'm going with Aetna this year. At least my doctor is in their network. I hope it's actually usable. Don't go with United Healthcare, their exchange plans are a complete sham. Their EPO plan is not tied to their normal network that you see on their website but to a much smaller "W500" network that doesn't have any doctors I am familiar with in Houston(I have maybe 6 doctors I am willing to see in town as a primary care physician). Their so-called drug plan is mail order only and doesn't pay for anything, so completely useless. They have the most complaints on the consumeraffairs website and most of the complaints are similar, bait and switch on the provider network, non-functioning drug plan.
Yep, my monthly charge, deductibles, and out of pockets maximums have gone up every year at an alarming rate since the inception of the train wreck that is Obamacare.
You might want to make sure the doctor is actually in there. according to justtxyank almost none of the plans have the real network available on the exchange. They would lose millions if they did.
Well it's still vastly inferior quality of health care but the Houston VA is one of the best in the country so the odds of them killing you are acceptable. The VA is good for normal doctor's appointments and the free meds are pretty cool....but if you need anything serious done or have anything major wrong with you, it's best to go to a real doctor and go to a real hospital.
The clinic in Kerrville is outstanding, I'm told. Going to the big hospital at Brooks in San Antone is a nightmare. Those are the only 2 I have secondhand experience with. I've heard great things, and I've heard just disgusting stories about the level of care/service. We should do better as a country.
* no Physicians are in the HMO Plans* So I look at our new 2016 Blue Cross HMO cards today. It had assigned us a Primary Care Physician. I googled him and he was in Killeen Texas; yes I'm in West Houston. So I called about it and the rep did not know exactly why that happened but said the patients were apportioned to the doctors. We agreed this was a mistake and were going to pick a new PCP. First of all the BCBS map showed very few doctors in West Houston and then the first 6 I picked came up "no longer in Network", the closest doctor I could get was Dr. Mao Chin on Bellaire (miles away), in fact all the doctors that were actually still on the network had Asian surnames.... not racist, just weird. I've got a couple of days to scramble to find a qualified PPO plan, Humana I guess maybe Memorial Herman. I'd appreciate any suggestions because it makes my eyes glaze over.
I do just about everything I can at the Richmond clinic, they are pretty good but appointments usually take 3 or 4 months. If you really need to see someone, you can show up any day and they'll try to squeeze you in if someone cancels but if you do that you have to be willing to wait potentially several hours. Still, it's pretty good quality and it's free, so it's sort of hard to complain too much. I hate the main VA hospital in Houston like poison and try to avoid it as much as possible. They REALLY need a parking structure built in the worst kind of way. They just have so many more patients than parking spaces it makes it almost impossible to get in there unless you show up early in the morning or if it happens to be a slow day.
