1. Should you buy health insurance from an agent, or directly from the company?

This one’s easy: use an independent health insurance agent. The rates are the same since they’re set by law, and agents don’t charge any sort of “broker’s fees” or anything to use their service. Agents tend to know a lot more about your options than your average call center employee, and they’ll work with you for the life of your policy.

2. What are the top five health insurance companies in Georgia?

Based on my personal experiences (level of client service, ease of application, claims payment record, etc.), I’d say that the top five individual health insurance companies in Georgia are:

1. Golden Rule (the individual division of United Health Care)
2. Humana
3. Assurant
4. Aetna
5. Kaiser Permanente

Each company has its quirks, of course – Golden Rule is great if you’re in perfect health, but they love to issue riders. Assurant is more expensive, but they are more lenient in their underwriting. Aetna will decline anyone with three prescriptions. Humana doesn’t offer maternity benefits, and Kaiser requires you to stay within Kaiser facilities with most of their plans. Every company is different.

3. Can I still get COBRA if I was fired?

In most cases, yes. There is a provision in the COBRA law that says you are ineligible for COBRA if you were “terminated for gross misconduct,” but that has never been tested in court. Generally, if you leave a company (either voluntarily or involuntarily) and that company stays in business and keeps the group plan that you were on in force, you can get COBRA.

4. Is there such a thing as emergency maternity coverage?

No. If you’re already pregnant, no major medical insurer will issue a policy to you. Now, there are some guaranteed issue policies that will cover you, but you must be extremely careful with those – oftentimes, you’ll either end up paying more for the policy than you would for the pregnancy, or you’ll get stuck with a bill that the insurer will weasel out of. Never purchase a policy like that without consulting with an agent, preferably an independent agent who can compare it with true major medical plans.

5. How do I get my pre-existing conditions covered with an individual health insurance policy?

Depending on the condition, it’s possible that you can just apply for coverage and have it covered. Things like high blood pressure, cholesterol, and most allergies aren’t generally excluded from coverage under individual health insurance policies (however, the rates to cover these conditions may be higher). If you have a more serious condition, like diabetes or Crohn’s Disease, your options are more limited. In Georgia, there’s no state risk pool, so if you’re above the income level for Medicaid then you’re not eligible for state assistance. Your best bet is to find employment with benefits, or, if you’re self employed, talk with an agent about going on a small group plan. That’s a tricky option, but it can be done. There are some guaranteed issue plans in Georgia that will cover pre-existing conditions, but like with question four, you must be extremely careful with those. You can wind up losing a lot of money if you’re not. 

6. What does maternity insurance cover?

Maternity insurance covers the costs associated with a normal pregnancy. Depending on how your specific maternity benefits are structured, you may either have a set amount of money to apply to maternity costs or your maternity costs may apply to a separate deductible. It’s worth noting that true emergency c-sections are covered by your normal health insurance plan.

7. What do I do when my COBRA runs out?

When your COBRA eligibility runs out, you can do one of two things. You can either purchase an individual policy, or you can elect to use a HIPAA conversion option. With HIPAA conversion, the health insurance company that administered your COBRA plan will switch you over to an individual plan, and you can’t be turned down for coverage. HIPAA conversions aren’t available until you have used up your entire COBRA eligibility period.

8. How does my deductible work?

Your deductible is the amount of money in medical costs you’ll be responsible for before your insurance company starts picking up part of the bill. If you have a copay plan, your copays generally will not apply to the deductible. Once you meet your deductible, then (depending on your plan) your insurance company will either pay 100% of the rest of your bills, or you’ll pay a small percentage until you reach your out-of-pocket limit. That small percentage is usually 20%, but some plans do increase that amount.

9. How did the new stimulus package change COBRA?

Previously, if you wanted to go on COBRA then you had to pay 102% of your health insurance premiums. That came as a shock to many people who went on COBRA, because they were used to paying only a portion of the full premium while their employer picked up the rest of the tab. Now, for the first nine months of COBRA eligibility, you’ll only pay 35% of your premiums and your former employer will pick up the other 65% (they’ll be reimbursed in the form of a payroll tax credit). At the end of those nine months, things go back to the way they used to be and you’ll start paying 102%.

10. What’s the best life insurance option for me?

Most people are best served with simple term life insurance. Get a policy that’s guaranteed renewable so that you never have to worry about being uninsurable, a face value that will provide for your loved ones (don’t forget to pay off debt and account for lost income when you’re figuring out how much you should get), and discuss the various riders available with your agent. In my humble opinion, variable life, universal life, and whole life are just not worth it for the vast majority of people. Term is simple, term is easy, and term is what you need. There are a ton of life insurance options out there, and with all the riders available you can really customize your term life insurance to fit your needs.

Bonus!

11. What does “no-stone-unturned” quote mean, anyway?

I get asked this one a lot, so I thought I’d toss it in there. I’m an independent agent, so when you come to me with a health or life insurance question I work with a bunch of different companies to make sure you’re getting the best deal on the market. Instead of just sticking you with an easy-to-issue policy, I leave no stone unturned to make sure that when I run a quote and write an application with you that I’m doing what’s in your best interest. 

Did I miss any burning questions? Anything you’re absolutely dying to know? Then feel free to comment on this post, use the contact link at the top of the page to email me, or just call me up at 404-660-1020 and I’ll be happy to answer any questions you might have. Who knows, your question might make it into the next edition of this article! Or if this cleared up all of your questions and you’re ready to see how much you could be saving on your insurance, then head to our free insurance quote page and get a no-obligation, personalized quote!

Reader’s Choice: Top Ten Health and Life Insurance Questions is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

You can find affordable health insurance in the private market!

In fact, let’s repeat that one, because a lot of people find it hard to believe: you can find affordable health insurance in the private market! Just because you’re getting health insurance as an individual instead of part of a group doesn’t mean you have to destroy your bank account every month. The secret is to realize that there’s not one magic bullet that can take health insurance from a giant money sink to just a small portion of your budget, but instead that there are a number of factors that will work together to make your health insurance affordable.

The first thing you should do is look into high deductible health plans. These insurance plans are a lot more simple than most types of health insurance: you have a deductible, and that’s about it. Before your deductible, you’re responsible for your medical costs. After your deductible, your insurance company will pay your bills. Simple! Because these plans don’t include a lot of bells and whistles (either you’re working on meeting your deductible or your insurance company is paying for everything), they’re affordable for the health insurance company – there’s just not a lot of stuff for them to worry about. That means that the savings are passed on to you, making high deductible health plans a very affordable form of health insurance.

If you decide to go with a high deductible health plan, making your health insurance more affordable is pretty simple. Raising your deductible will lower your monthly premiums, and lowering your deductible will raise them. One thing that you should always keep in mind when you’re looking at deductibles is how your particular insurance company defines a “family deductible.” Some companies will assign every family member an individual deductible, some will assign the family as a whole a deductible, and others will give individual deductibles but say that when either two or three family members meet them then the entire family’s deductible is considered met. Your agent will know how each individual company handles family deductibles.

The major thing that people worry about with high deductible health plans is the fact that office visits aren’t covered by a copay. In our dedicated article about HDHP’s we discuss why this isn’t as big an issue as many people think, but if an office visit copay is something you feel like you can’t live without then you still have ways to find affordable health insurance.

The first of these is to ask yourself how many times a year you actually go to the doctor. If it’s only three or four times, but you still really want a copay for those visits, then consider looking at limited copay plans. These plans offer comprehensive benefits and a copay for a certain number of office visits a year (usually two to six). The first few visits are covered by a copay, but after that you’ll be responsible for the full amount of your medical bills until you meet your deductible. Having a limited number of copays a year instead of an unlimited number will make your health insurance significantly more affordable.

The second big thing you can do is to raise your deductible. Having a slightly higher deductible can drastically lower your monthly premiums. This one is pretty self-explanatory: raising your deductible lowers the amount of financial risk the insurance company takes on, saving them money. Those savings are passed on to you in the form of more affordable health insurance.

The last thing is something you should do no matter what: work with an independent agent. There are no “broker’s fees” or anything like that when you work with an agent, so you’ll end up paying the same in premiums that you would going directly to the insurance company. And since independent agents work with several insurance companies, we know who has the best rates and best coverage for various situations. For instance, for the majority of people in Georgia, maybe Carrier A is the most affordable. But perhaps for people in a certain age range Carrier B has better rates, and for people with high blood pressure Carrier C has the most affordable premiums. Your agent, who will have the ability to shop around and work the system in your favor, will be able to find the most affordable health insurance premiums while not sacrificing coverage.

Affordable health insurance is out there, and now you know the easiest way to find it is to use an independent health insurance agent. Luckily, you’ve got an independent agent at your disposal right now! Head on over to our free health insurance quote page and find out just how much you could be saving!

Getting Affordable Health Insurance is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

If you look around this website, you’ll find pages and pages of information about how wonderful it is to use an independent agent, how having an expert on your side can save you time and money when dealing with health insurance companies, and how having your own, personal agent on call to address your insurance needs can truly save you. But, there is one downside to using an independent insurance agent: we’ve got access to hundreds of different policies.

Now usually that’s a good thing. It means that you have a great deal of choice, that you’re not tied down to any one company or product line, and that your agent can just about always find a policy that offers the right combination of protection and monthly cost for your needs. However, that amount of choice can also get a little overwhelming and can make the task of narrowing things down to just one plan seem slightly daunting. Imagine walking onto the lot at a Carmax and just telling a salesman “I want a car.” He’d probably look at you blankly and have no idea where to get started, right? Even though that car salesman knows where everything is on the lot and knows the details and specs for all of his cars, he still needs you to let him know a little about what you want in order to help you find the right vehicle for you. So you go to the dealership armed with a little information, like how many passengers you want to be able to seat, what color you want, what kind of interior, and so on and so forth. Health insurance works in a very similar way – there are hundreds of plans out there, and the benefits are very different with all of them. Some cover well-care for children, while some have excellent accident benefits. Some have better copay structures, while some have an awesome health savings account component. If you know a little bit about what you want, you and your agent can work together much more effectively to find the policy that will work best for you.

So, how do you do that? How do you go about figuring out what type of policy is best for you and your family? You don’t have to have all of the answers, of course, since you’ll be working closely with an independent agent and he’ll be able to help you figure that out, but like we discussed a moment ago, it’s a good plan to have a basic idea of what your needs regarding health insurance will be.

In my experience, the best way to get started is to ask yourself three questions:

1. What do I like about your current policy?
2. What don’t I like about your current policy?
3. If I could design a policy from the ground up for yourself, what would you put in it?

Answering these three questions will just about always point you towards the right policy for you. There are a few things to keep in mind when you’re asking yourself these things.

When you’re thinking about what you like about your current health insurance plan, think about the past few times you’ve had to use it. Have you been to the doctor’s office or emergency room lately? Did you have a copay for either visit? Have you had to call your insurance company recently, and if so, were you satisfied with the level of customer service you received? What kind of deductible do you have now? How are your prescription drugs handled?

Thinking about these things will also probably reveal what you don’t like about your current plan. Maybe your current deductible is too high, or your prescriptions aren’t covered like you want them to be. Maybe you don’t have a copay and you want one – or maybe you do have a copay, but you never use it and want to lower your premiums by doing away with it.

When you get through thinking about what you like and don’t like about your current insurance policy, you should have a decent idea about how you feel about your deductible, your copay, and your premiums. Additionally, if you’ve had to use your health insurance lately, you’ll probably have an idea about any special circumstances you want your policy to cover (for instance, if chiropractic care is covered, if wellness benefits are included, and so on).

Now with that information, you’re ready to tackle the third question: if you could design a policy from the ground up, what would you put in it? This is where you get to make sure any special considerations you may have are taken care of. For example, do you want to make sure that your child under age five will have free well-care checkups? Do you want to make sure a certain prescription drug is covered? Do you want to have extra coverage if you have some kind of accident (known as a supplemental accident benefit)?

The next step is to take this idealized plan you’ve built and give it an unfortunate “reality check.” Personally, I want a health insurance plan that has a $10/year deductible, covers all of my office visits with a $2 copay, gives me free prescription drugs whenever they’re prescribed, sends me Chinese food on Fridays, and does it all for under $5 a month. That plan, however, doesn’t exist, which means you’ll need to identify which category you have more flexibility in: are you more willing to let your premiums go up a little to get the coverage you want, or do you want to increase your deductible and maybe eliminate your copay to get down to the monthly premiums you can afford?

Think about this: the difference between a $1500 and a $2500 deductible is $1000 a year, but if you save $84 a month by moving to a higher deductible, then you’ll have made up that difference just from your premium savings. That means you have that money in your pocket instead of sending it to the insurance company – and believe me, if you don’t meet that $1500 deductible, they’re not going to send any of your money back for “overpaying” them. Raising your deductible can put extra money in your pocket while still giving you comprehensive coverage, and is probably the area you should look at when you’re trying to figure out how to fit health insurance into your monthly budget.

Now, you’ve identified what you like about your current policy, what you don’t, and what you would change. On top of that, you’ve figured out what sort of deductible you’d like to look at, if you want an office visit copay, and any special things you want included in your new health insurance policy. Furthermore, you’ve figured where you can be flexible if you have to be: benefits, or premiums. The only thing that’s left is to sit down and start looking at policies until you find one that matches what you want.

Everything up to now has sounded harder than it really is. Unfortunately, this last part flips that on its head by sounding significantly easier than it is. There’s much more to the final step than writing down a deductible, copay, and premium amount and just looking at plans until one matches up. This is where your independent agent comes in. With access to hundreds of different policies, that choice that earlier looked overwhelming now just looks welcoming.

With the knowledge you’ve gained from reading and applying the techniques outlined in this article, you and your independent agent are now ready to sit down and figure out the exact policy that will work best for you. And remember, working with your independent agent to select your personal health insurance policy isn’t just a one-time interaction – you’ll be getting an expert on your side who will work for you for the life of your policy. But you’ve already read the article about Why You Should Use an Independent Agent, right?

When you’re ready to start working with your own independent agent, visit our free Georgia insurance quote center. You’ll be shocked at how easy it is to work with an independent insurance agent, and even more shocked at how affordable insurance can be!

How To Choose The Right Health Insurance Policy is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

1. What’s the deductible?

This should be the first question you ask about any policy. The deductible is the amount of money that must come out of your pocket before your health insurance company will begin paying benefits. So, if you have a $500 deductible, and you get a $750 hospital bill, then your benefits will kick in on the last $250. That first $500 will be applied to your deductible.

Your deductible will have a massive impact on your health insurance premiums. Having a higher deductible will lower your premiums, and having a lower deductible will raise them.

Take care to note, however, that that doesn’t mean you’ll only have to pay $500 dollars and consider that $250 handled. Many health insurance plans have a coinsurance amount linked to an out-of-pocket limit. In fact…

2. What’s my coinsurance and out-of-pocket?

Depending on the company, the “out-of-pocket” limit may also be called a “stop-loss” or “break point,” but these things are all the same. Your out-of-pocket limit is the amount of money beyond your deductible that you’ll be responsible for before your plan pays 100% of your remaining medical costs. The out-of-pocket limit is always paired with a coinsurance amount, which defines what percentage of costs beyond your deductible you’ll be responsible for on any given bill. So for instance, if you’ve satisfied your deductible but have a $1000 out-of-pocket limit with an 80% coinsurance, and you get a bill for $100 dollars:

• The insurance company will pay $80 of this bill
• You’ll be responsible for $20 of this bill
• And that $20 will be applied to your out-of-pocket limit, reducing the balance down to $980.

So, even though the bill was $100 dollars, you were only responsible for $20 because you had met your deductible. With these numbers, if you had medical bills (after your deductible) totalling $5000, you would be responsible for $1000 and the insurance company would pay the remaining $4000. Paying that $1000 would also cause you to reach your out-of-pocket limit, so any additional covered medical bills within your beneift period would be covered at 100%. Out-of-pocket limits are generally locked into various policies, so even if your agent can adjust the deductible it’s common that the out-of-pocket can’t be changed.

One important thing to note is that if you have a high deductible health plan, or HDHP, you usually won’t have an out-of-pocket limit. Once you meet your deductible, your costs will generally be covered at 100%.

3. Is the deductible per-incident, per-confinement, or per-year?

This one is huge. One of the sneakiest ways health insurance companies reduce their risk, and therefore lower their costs and raise their profits, is by defining their deductibles by confinement or incident instead of the standard per-year definition. With most health insurance policies, once you meet your deductible, you’ve met it for the year. Any further medical bills will be applied to your out-of-pocket limit, and then covered at 100% once that is satisfied. This means that if you have more than one incident in a year that causes you to incur significant medical costs, you’ll be covered.

However, if you have per-confinement or per-incident deductibles, things are very, very different.

With per-confinement or per-incident deductibles, every time you have a situation where you require medical attention is subjected to its own deductible. So if you have a $1000 per confinement deductible then have food poisoning in January, a broken arm in March, strep throat in June, a routine OBGYN visit in August, a case of the sniffles in October, and you cut your hand open carving the Thanksgiving turkey, then each one of these incidents is subjected to its own $1000 deductible!! In other words, say the total medical bills related to your food poisoning come out to $800, your broken arm is $750, the two doctor’s office visits together come out to $350, and then the ER visit for the Thanksgiving mishap comes out to $500. That totals up to $2400 in medical bills for the year, which means that $1000 should apply to the deductible and $1400 to the out-of-pocket limit, right? Nope — you’ve got per-incident deductibles, and not a single one of those visits cost more than $1000. That means that with each new medical incident your deductible reset back to $1000, and you never once met it. Every last dollar of those medical bills comes out of your pocket, because the deductible was per-incident, not per-year.

Long story short, deductibles should be per year, not per incident or per confinement, especially if you have more than one person on the policy. MEGA Life and Health is infamous for defining its deductibles by incident instead of by year. Golden Rule’s short-term medical plans also use per-incident deductibles, which is why they’re one of the cheapest short-term medical policies on the market.

4. Do I have an office visit copay?

When you go to the doctor, some insurance plans hold you responsible for the entire sum of the bill (subject to your deductible and coinsurance, of course) while others employ a copay. Basically, when you have a copay, you’re responsible only for a nominal fee to go see your doctor instead of the full bill. That fee usually hovers around $15-$35 for a primary care physician (a family doctor) and $25-$55 for a specialist (an orthopaedic doctor, dermatologist, OBGYN, or other, specialized doctor).

On the face of things, a copay sounds fantastic. Instead of being responsible for the entire cost of a doctor’s office visit, a copay reduces the cost to a predictable amount that is essentially always lower than the full bill. However, adding a copay to your insurance plan is the number two biggest thing you can do to increase your monthly premiums (number one is lowering your deductible). Think about this: how many times a year do you go to the doctor? Most people will say anywhere from one to three visits is average for them. The additional cost you would pay upfront for those one to three visits a year is almost always offset by the amount of money you’ll save off of your monthly premiums by switching to a plan that doesn’t offer an office visit copay. Let’s run the numbers:

• The average cost of a primary care visit is $60; a specialist visit averages about $175
• The average primary care copay is about $35; for a specialist, that’s about $50

So in a year that you went to your primary care doctor twice and a specialist once, you’d pay $120 on a copay plan or $295 for a plan that doesn’t offer copays. The difference there is $175, or a little under $15 a month. In this scenario, it makes sense that if you can save over $15 a month by eliminating copays from your plan, then it’s smarter to be without copays than to include them. I can say with a great deal of confidence that if two plans are identical in every way except that one offers a copay and one doesn’t, then the plan without a copay will always offer savings greater than $15/month in premiums.

If you’re really, really tied to having a copay, then consider asking your agent about a plan with a limited number of office visits covered by copays a year. Most limited-copay plans give you six or so office visits a year covered by a copay, and you’ll be responsible for the full bill after those visits until you meet your deductible. These plans give you a compromise by lowering your premiums but still giving you the comfort of the copay.

5. Do I have a limited period to get diagnostic tests?

After the per-confinement deductible, this is the worst trick an insurance company can pull. With most plans, diagnostic tests can be done at any time so long as they’re medically necessary. This means that if you think you’ve broken your hand, you go to the doctor, have an x-ray, and then find out that you’ve just bruised it, well, no big deal. That x-ray was deemed medically necessary by your doctor, and therefore it was a covered expense.

This changes, however, with some types of health insurance plans. Certain plans allow diagnostics only in a certain time period before and after a surgical procedure or inpatient confinement. For instance, some MEGA Life and Health plans allow diagnostics only fourteen days before and/or fourteen days after a surgery or inpatient confinement. This means that, in our example above, the x-ray would not have been a covered expense because no surgery resulted from it.

That limited window for diagnostics can be a minor pain when dealing with things like hand x-rays, but it can be absolutely devastating when dealing with monitoring a long-term condition like leukemia, or monitoring recovery after major surgery. You have health insurance to cover medical costs, so why would you accept a plan with such a fundamental limitation?

These five questions will give you a great deal of information about your plan by covering the basics (copay, out-of-pocket, and deductible) and will make sure you catch it if the policy includes one of the two most common sneaky limitations (per-confinement deductibles and diagnostic windows) that insurance companies use to limit your benefits. When I sit down with a client, these are always the first five things we go over, because I know that these five points are the most important things they could ask me to make sure they’re getting the level of coverage that they need.

There’s one question that’s not on the list, because it’s the one everyone already knows to ask: what’s the cost? Well, the easiest and safest way to figure that out is to head up to our free Georgia insurance quote page and get a free, no-obligation, no-stone-unturned insurance quote. You’ll be amazed at how easy insurance can be when you work with an independent agent, and shocked at how affordable insurance can be when you have an expert in your corner!

Top Five Questions For Your Health Insurance Agent is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

For some reason, people are often reluctant to talk about life insurance. Maybe they think that discussing it means admitting their own mortality. Maybe they think that talking about it makes the possibility of death into a certainty. Or maybe it’s because they’re afraid to admit that the money they’ve made from working hard their whole life won’t be enough to cover their final costs. Whatever the reason, life insurance isn’t often thought of as a fun topic of conversation. And because of that, people push it to the back of their minds, try not to think about it, and hope that their savings account and three bedroom two bathroom house in the city will provide all the assets their loved ones need after they’re gone.

In the early 2000’s, my mother and father lived in a four bedroom two bathroom house on the Satilla River in Woodbine, Georgia and the real estate market was good. My parents were out eating dinner one night and happened to mention, just in passing during a conversation they were having between themselves, how fair their house was from the river. Their house wasn’t on the market, but they got two offers to purchase it on the spot – without marketing it or even listing it! Even though at the time my father was in his late sixties and my mother had just crossed fifty years old, they didn’t worry about final expenses or their debt. If things got too bad, no trouble. The real estate market was good, so if worse came to worst they could just sell the house and cover their expenses by downgrading to a smaller home. In 2005, the real estate market began slipping.

By mid-2006, the real estate market in southeast Georgia had crashed.

Around Thanksgiving 2006, my father started feeling ill.

By Christmas 2006, he started stumbling over words and forgetting things he normally wouldn’t. He didn’t want to worry about it, so he didn’t talk about it. He just pretended nothing was wrong. I guess it wasn’t a fun topic of conversation.

On May 9^th, 2007, my father was diagnosed with cancer of the brain, bone, lungs, blood, and colon. That day was my parents’ 32^nd wedding anniversary, and I still have the journal that my dad wrote in that afternoon.

On July 29^th, 2007, at 12:40 in the morning, my father died. It would take a little while, but before too long we realized that we were in trouble. There was more debt than we had realized, and there were medical bills coming in that his health insurance was doing nothing to cover (which leads me to plead with you again – even if you don’t use me, please use a local independent agent for your health insurance needs, someone you can build trust with and someone who has your best interests at heart). We did everything we could, but things quickly got out of control. My father didn’t have life insurance, and his estate was unmanageable.

This story doesn’t have as sad an ending as it could. That house on the river sold about a month before we would have run out of money and provided my mother with enough capital to stabilize herself and move back to Alabama, where she grew up. But it was a very, very close call, and there’s a lesson to be learned from it. If you expect your savings account to cover your final expenses, then you need to realize that that’s going to mean that those savings are going to be wiped out. If you expect your loved ones to carry the burden, then you have to be prepared for the responsibility of placing that heavy, heavy load upon their shoulders – and you have to realize, like it or not, that no matter how hard they try to feel otherwise they almost certainly won’t be able to help a few feelings of resentment. And if you’re hoping that your non-liquid assets like your real estate, your classic car, or your antique coin collection will provide a source of cash, then you have to consider that those things all take time to sell, that those you leave behind will be likely be too preoccupied to negotiate a fair price, and that it’s truly difficult for your loved ones to sell off all of your possessions when they’re desperately trying to cling to everything that reminds them of you.

Furthermore, while the assets you leave behind may be enough to pay for the cost of your burial, your car payment, and your mortgage, will it be enough to replace the income that your loved ones suddenly find themselves without? And finally, to the folks in their twenties and thirties, don’t think life insurance is only for people in their sixties and seventies. For just a few bucks a month, you could have coverage right now that protects your loved ones in the event of your death, meaning that you can worry about building your career and your life without running the risk of having it all fall apart should a tragedy befall you. Be honest – if you’re twenty-five and newlywed, do you have enough set aside to cover your financial responsibilities and provide for your spouse if something were to happen to you? The answer is probably “no,” and that’s okay. You’re just starting out in life! But that means it’s all the more important for you to protect the integrity of what you’ve accomplished, and the best way to do that is with life insurance.

So, once you’ve realized that you do need life insurance, what next? Well, there are a few major different types of life insurance: term life, whole life, and universal life.

Term life insurance is the simplest, most straightforward type of life insurance. Term life is also the least expensive type of life insurance. Basically, you buy a policy that is in force for a set period of time – a set “term.”If the insured person were to die during that period of time, the policy would pay the entire face value. So, for example, if you purchased a ten year term policy to insure your life and you passed away three years later, the policy would pay the full death benefit to the beneficiary.

When most people think of life insurance, they think of whole life. Whole life provides permanent protection while building a cash value. Premiums are generally fixed along the life of the policy. The cash value of the policy means that, should you need to at any point, you can withdraw money from your policy or even take loans against it, providing you with a small source of emergency funds. All of this is, of course, in addition to the normal death benefit of the policy.

Universal life is the most flexible form of life insurance. Over the life of the policy, you can adjust the premium amounts and payment schedule to better suit your needs at any given time. Universal life policies also accrue a cash value, just like whole life. That cash value allows you to earn a small rate of return based on market rates as well, so you can think of whole and universal life insurance as a low-risk source of very small returns.

So which one is best? Well, that depends on your needs, and a true needs analysis is beyond the scope of this article. The very, very broad brush answer, however is this: if you need life insurance to cover the risk associated with limited time propositions (for example, you want to make sure that if you pass away your kids have enough money to finish college) then term life is probably for you. If, on the other hand, you’re looking for permanent protection that will last for the rest of your life and provide an inheritance for your loved ones, then you need to look at whole or universal life.

To get started with your personalized needs analysis, head up to our term life insurance quote page and let me know a little more about yourself. I believe very strongly in the need for life insurance because of my personal history, and I know that I can help you get the protection that my family should have had. I’m ready to help you whenever you are.

Life Insurance – Why and How is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

Related posts:

1. Georgia Universal Life Insurance Georgia life insurance doesn't just consist of whole and term...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

You’ve put your gender, date of birth, and desired date of coverage into a website. Then you’ve been shown three or four plans, each with different premiums and levels of coverage. Even though these plans are backed by contracts which range anywhere from fifteen to a hundred pages in length, the only information you’re given about your options is summed up in three or four bullet points. Do you know exactly what these plans cover? No – at best, you know the office copay, deductible, out-of-pocket limit, coinsurance, and monthly premium. Let’s say you select one of these plans – now they ask you for more information. Height, weight, medical conditions, a few other personal questions, and contact information. Now the fun begins. If you’ve put this information into a carrier’s website, you might get one or two agents from that insurance company calling you to talk to you about what sort of coverage you want. If you’ve put this information into a website offering “Free Instant Quotes From All Major Carriers!!!” then you’re likely about to be in for a shock. That information is instantly sold to anywhere from one to twenty-five agents who will immediately jump on their phone to try to get at you first – you’ve just become a “hot lead,” not a “person” with a “family” who has “insurance needs.” Whether you used an insurance company’s website or a “quote warehouse,” you’ve got problems.

If you used an insurance company’s website, you’re going to be contacted by “captive agents.” Now I’ll give them credit, captive agents usually know their products inside and out. If you have an Aetna captive agent on the other end of the phone trying to sell you an Aetna policy, then he’s going to know just about everything there is to know about that policy. Problem is, he’s not going to know about what Golden Rule, Humana, Assurant, or anyone else has to offer, and he’s certainly not going to encourage you to find out. It’s sort of like going to buy a new car – the Ford salesman is going to try to sell you a Ford, and if he mentions a Chevrolet at all it’s just going to be to tell you how much better his products are. If you get an Aetna agent on one line and a Humana agent on the other, they’re both going to tell you that their policies are the best fit for you. More importantly, they’re not going to highlight the same things about their policies, meaning you’re not going to be able to make an informed and complete comparison. That’s why shopping the major carriers direct just doesn’t work – it results in you being forced to compare apples to oranges when what you really wanted was a banana, anyway.

Things are worse if you enter your information into a quote warehouse site. The agents that will contact you regarding these plans are agents that have bought your information as a “lead” from a website like www.prospectzone.com. More likely than not, your information was sold to at least three agents (sometimes, significantly more – up to twenty-five in some cases) who will all fall all over themselves to get to you before the others do. Then, knowing that there are other agents hitting their redial button, these agents go for the high-pressure quick close. Usually, this means putting you into the cheapest policy they can – the commission check might be lower, but it’s a volume game at this point – regardless of whether or not the benefits suit your needs. These agents assume that if they can quote you a cheaper premium than anyone else, then they’ll make the sale – the quality of the coverage is hardly even a concern! There’s no personal attention, there’s no comparison of policies, there’s no dedication to client service; there’s only trying to pressure you into the sale and, if you don’t feel comfortable buying right away, dumping you and moving on to the next lead that hits their email inbox.

There is one problem common to both of these scenarios, and it’s a big one. When you apply for health or life insurance, your application goes through what’s called an “underwriting process.” During this time, your application is evaluated to make sure the insurance company knows just what it’s getting into when they agree to insure you (this is also the time during which your premiums might be adjusted based on the level of risk you present to the company, or when certain conditions may be “ridered out” as uninsurable). One of the tools underwriters use to evaluate what level of risk you present to the company comes from information made available by the Medical Information Bureau. The MIB, according to their website, alerts its member insurance companies to omissions and fraud during the underwriting of life, health, and other types of insurance. One of the things that will show up in your MIB report is if you’ve ever been declined for health or life insurance coverage before. If you show a decline in your record, it becomes much more difficult for you to be considered an acceptable risk by the company with which you presently want to get insurance. Now, the quickest way for an agent to get a commission check is to get your application out of the door as quickly as possible. Sometimes, agents will send your application to multiple insurance companies at the same time just in case one or two don’t go through. The problem here is this: if these applications get declined, you’re going to have a much more difficult time getting health or life insurance. Since you’re just another “hot lead,” though, and not a person with a family and needs, that doesn’t matter – the goal here is to get your application out as quickly as possible and move on to the next target.

Now tell me: Do either of these scenarios sound like they’re going to result in you getting the policy that’s best suited to your needs? Do you think either scenario ends with you having an agent that remembers your name, your needs, and will still be there to help you in three months when you have a question about your policy?

You have another option – find your local independent agent! Now of course, I’m a little biased (after all, I’m hoping that when you go looking for that independent agent, you’ll find me), but things really are different when you go this route. Shopping for insurance becomes a stress-free, hassle-free experience. When you pick up the phone and call me, or send me an email, message me on Facebook, or even DM me on Twitter, our business is strictly between the two of us. Your information isn’t shared with other agents, sold to mailing lists, or put in some online database so that other people can see your private information. You’re not a lead, you’re not a deal, you’re not an appointment – you’re a client, and you’re someone whose health and life coverage I take personal responsibility for.

Your local independent agent has access to more than just one carrier – not like the captive agents that work directly for the major insurance companies. For instance, I currently offer products from Humana, Aetna, Assurant, Golden Rule, GTL, Imerica, Madison National, World Insurance, Genworth, Colorado Banker’s Life, and AIG, as well as a nifty standalone dental plan through AHCP. And guess what – I have no reason to sell one of these carriers over the other! That means you get a fair and balanced comparison of these major insurance companies and the policies that they offer with no hidden agenda. That also means that you get access to a LOT more options than you would have with a captive agent.

You also get the personal touch. If my email inbox filled up with fifty purchased “hot leads” a day and I called each and every one of them, there’s no way I could remember all the names of the people I called by the end of the day. By the end of the week, forget it! But when you contact your local independent agent directly, you have the chance to have an expert in your corner working for you, not for an insurance company. Now think about this: seven months down the line, when you have a question about your policy, who do you want to call? The giant call-center at the insurance company? The agent that bought your information and a hundred others online and forgot who you were the second his commission check came in? Or would you rather call your local independent agent who went over your policy with you, took the time to shop for you and, out of a sea of options, found the policy that best protects you and your family? The answer to this one should be obvious!

And remember a few paragraphs ago when we were talking about how each and every time your application is declined by an insurance company it gets harder and harder – and eventually impossible – for you to get coverage? Well, that’s only a problem when you deal with someone in a captive agency or someone who has a hundred phone calls to make by the end of the day. Your local agent, who works for you, can call the insurance company before sending your application in. I can call up an underwriter at any of my carriers, give them my agent ID, give them a little information and find out if that policy will be issued, issued with an increased premium, or cancelled. But since I can do that without giving away who is applying, if they tell me the application will be declined then I never even have to send it in. That means there’s no black mark on your MIB records, and that means you still have a chance to get coverage with another company.

There’s one more thing about having your own local independent agent, which almost makes the arrangement too good to be true. We’ve already discussed the fact that your local independent agent will be someone you have the chance to have a personal relationship with and who will always be available to help you with your policy questions. And we’ve already discussed the fact that this local independent agent works for you, not for the insurance company. And we’ve discussed the fact that with a local independent agent you can, at any time, pick up the phone or write an email and have an on-call expert to answer your insurance questions. But here’s the best part. Ready?

It’s all at no additional charge.

You can pay your insurance premiums and have a faceless company that doesn’t know who you are and what your situation is. You can pay your insurance premiums and have a “churn and burn” agent who is interested only in selling you a policy as fast as possible and moving on to the next mark. Or, for the same price, you can have a local independent agent working to protect your family 24/7. Your premiums are going to be the same in every case (and this is by law – insurance companies aren’t allowed to charge different premiums based on who you buy your policy from). The only difference is in the level of service and personalized attention you’ll receive.

Now, there are three ways to buy life and/or health insurance: direct from the company, online through a quote warehouse, or through your local independent agent. The price will be the same for all of them. Knowing what you now know, which one do you think is the right choice?

I think the answer is obvious. Using an independent agent is easy, it’s free, and it’s the surest way to guarantee that you’re getting the best, most affordable policy for your needs. To enlist the help of an independent agent, head up to our free Georgia insurance quote page and get ready to see what it’s like to have a true expert working for you! And by the way, filling our that free quote form is perfectly safe and completely private – I’m the only person who will see the information you submit, and I will never share it with or sell it to anyone. Your privacy is my priority – trust me!

Why You Should Use an Independent Agent is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

As you know, when you have an independent insurance agent, you have access to all the health insurance companies that agent represents. And, as you know, this is the time of year when a lot of our policies are renewing, which also means a lot of our plans are seeing rate adjustments.

Unfortunately, the majority of the time those rate adjustments go upwards rather than downwards. It looks like this year won’t be any exception, especially with the way our economy is trending. Today, I’ve talked with several people who are reporting rate increases from Golden Rule and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia, as well as less severe rate increases with Imerica and Assurant. My own research has borne this out — it looks like these companies are increasing rates across the board.

Keep in mind, this isn’t based on any official information from the insurance companies. This is just something I’m watching on my end, and I’m personally seeing a lot of higher premiums for the same coverage.

That being said, major kudos to Humana. From what I can tell, Humana’s rates are holding steady with no sacrifice of benefits. I’m keeping an eye on this, and I’m going to spend some time this week calling current clients to make sure that they’re still satisfied with their coverage.

Rate hikes, especially when they come out of nowhere, can really disrupt your monthly budget. That’s why I always, always recommend a twelve-month rate guarantee to my new clients. Locking your rates in for the first year adds an element of predictability to your plan, which is a great deal for a product that exists to provide asset protection.

If you want to evaluate your current plan against the shifting market to make sure that you’re still getting the best rate possible, check out our free Georgia insurance quote page to get your free, personalized, no-stone-unturned quote. You never know how much you could be saving until you get your agent to research the market for you!

Georgia Insurance Options: Rate Watch January 2009 is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Insurance might seem like a strange thing to have a passion for, but it’s where my heart lies. Before you put the responsibility for your health and life insurance into my hands, I’d like you to know a little bit about who I am, where I came from, and why I’m dedicated to doing the best job for you that I possibly can.

I’m a graduate of the University of Georgia (go Dawgs!) and proudly hold a Bachelor’s Degree of the Arts in Sociology. At first glance, it may not seem like a sociology degree from the University of Georgia is the most impressive qualification for an independent insurance agent. Perhaps finance, business, or economics would seem more appropriate – but I’d argue that you’d be wrong. The focus of my degree was on quantitative demographic analysis, which means I have spent years crunching numbers to track trends in all sorts of areas. Applying that knowledge to the insurance industry means I not only watch trends as they develop, but I anticipate what will happen in the future. We’ve all heard horror stories about people signing up with a health insurance carrier at a great rate only to see their premiums skyrocket midway through the year. Wouldn’t you want an agent who knows how to track and anticipate that sort of thing? Remember the article on this very website about why you should use an independent agent: you can shop for your own insurance, you can buy direct from the insurance companies, and you can pay a monthly premium. Or, you can use an independent agent, pay the same premiums and no additional fees, and have an expert working for you to select the best policy for your needs. In other words, you can use an independent agent and, at no extra cost, get someone to research all of your options for you and present you with the best ones. Now, doesn’t it make sense that an agent with a college degree in research and analysis is a smart choice?

I’ve worked with insurance ever since graduating from college. As a benefits specialist for a major medical group in the Atlanta, Georgia area, I analyzed and applied the benefits of anywhere from twenty (on a slow day) to one hundred fifty patients every day. In an average week, I would review the health insurance policies of at least four hundred patients. When I say I’m a health insurance expert, it’s not me artificially inflating my credentials: if there’s a policy sold in the state of Georgia, chances are I’ve seen it, I’ve worked with it, and I know just what to expect from it. And I know, from real-world experience, what types of policies work best in what situations. I know what carriers and what networks work best in what geographic areas of our state. And believe me, I know what the consequences of having the wrong coverage can be.

In fact, it’s that last point that led me to leave my position as a benefits specialist for a career in independent health insurance sales, education, and consultation. I lost track within three weeks of starting that job how many people I watched go bankrupt because they either didn’t have the coverage they thought they had or because they thought they could save money by not carrying health insurance. That plan never works – we all get sick, we all have accidents, and we will all incur medical bills. But I wasn’t allowed to say that to our patients, because our golden rule was “We identify benefits, not advise on them.”

Well, privacy laws and personal ethics prevent me from discussing the straw that broke this camel’s back, but suffice to say I saw one too many people walk out of our doors completely broke because they had health insurance that didn’t serve their needs. It wasn’t the fault of our clinic – we followed standard billing guidelines and I never personally saw a charge posted that I didn’t think was fair. It wasn’t the fault of our patients – in almost every case, they had coverage that they thought was more comprehensive than it truly was, and if that wasn’t the case then they honestly believed that they couldn’t afford health insurance. And it wasn’t the fault of the big bad insurance companies – their policies were written and selected by the patients, and claims were paid as promised (most of the time). Health insurance is complicated, and policy contracts are difficult to read. If you’ve never been exposed to them before, they can be completely incomprehensible.

But somewhere along the line, someone forgot to explain to these patients just what was going to be covered and what wasn’t. Someone forgot that you sell a health insurance policy to a living, breathing person with a spouse and a family and a business to run, not a faceless name in a ledger. And so, I took the experience I gathered from reviewing literally thousands upon thousands of policies, left that medical group, and began applying my experience and expertise to filling that gap. And now, I don’t work for the doctors, and I don’t work for the insurance company: I work for you, my client.

If you have any questions about my professional qualifications or affiliations, please use the contact form located on this website to get in touch with me. I’m always excited to speak with new people. A lot of insurance agents like to say that they’re self-employed, but I like to say that I work for my clients. It might seem like a strange decision to trade my one boss for hundreds, but I can’t imagine a more fulfilling profession. So, if you’d like to hire me, I’m always open to an interview! If you want to see how much money I can save you, then head over to my free Georgia insurance quote page and get your personalized insurance quote today!

Know Your Georgia Insurance Agent: Nick Perry’s Biography is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Health insurance can be a complicated thing to figure out alone. A lot of questions immediately spring to mind when looking at health insurance policies. What’s a premium and how are they paid? What’s a copay? How does my deductible work? What do you mean “coinsurance?” In this article, we’re going to go over the basics of individual health insurance policies and try to clear up some common misconceptions. After reading this, you’ll be a more informed consumer and better equipped to select a health insurance policy appropriate for your needs!

First things first, what is health insurance and why do you need it? This question’s simple. Health insurance is a type of insurance that protects you against the costs of medical care – and believe me, medical care can be expensive! Take a look at a few real-life claims and imagine how different the patient’s situation might have been without the coverage provided by their medical insurance (for reference, these claims were paid by Assurant Health). When you see “cost to patient” below, that cost generally represents the patient’s deductible and coinsurance. Don’t worry, we’ll cover exactly what these terms mean soon!

• 38 year old male, heart attack
  • Cost to patient: $3500
  • Amount paid by insurance company: $92,729.87
• 18 year old female, multiple injuries resulting from motor vehicle accident
  • Cost to patient: $550
  • Amount paid by insurance company: $165,818.16
• 13 year old male, leg broken in bicycle accident
  • Cost to patient: $5500
  • Amount paid by insurance company: $337,404.68
• 33 year old male, complications from prescription medication
  • Cost to patient: $3,838.98
  • Amount paid by insurance company: $1,467,700.55

Now, it’s obvious that having health insurance protected these people from HUGE medical bills that might have otherwise had a severely negative impact on their financial well being. You may read those claims and think to yourself “But I thought they had health insurance! They pay their premiums for coverage – why did they have to pay anything at all?” This is where several very important elements of any health insurance plan come in: the premium, the co-pay, the deductible, out-of-pocket limit and the coinsurance. Let’s go over these one by one.

Many plans include a copay, which is most easily explained as a small, set dollar amount that covers certain medical services. For instance, if your plan has a $20 copay for a primary care physician’s office visit, then a trip to your family doctor will cost you $20 out of pocket and the insurance company will pay the remaining balance for the visit. Plans with copays generally offer them for doctor’s office visits, prescription drugs, emergency room visits, and sometimes visits to outpatient surgical centers. It’s very important to make sure you know exactly what services are covered by your insurance copay before you solicit or agree to services provided by medical practitioners. Some copays include all services that can be included during the course of an office visit, while others may only cover the physician’s evaluation – any diagnostic tests, applications of casts, injections, or other miscellaneous services might not be covered. If you have questions as to what your policy covers, contact your health insurance agent. Your agent should be familiar with your individual policy and will be able to review your policy with you and answer any questions you might have.

A deductible is the amount of money that you, the patient, are 100% responsible for before your insurance plan will pay anything beyond what is outlined in your copay agreement. If your plan has a $1000 deductible, you will have to pay one thousand dollars towards the cost of your medical care before your plan begins to pay any benefits. As a general rule, the higher the deductible is on a policy, the lower the premiums. This is because the insurance company assumes less of the financial risk of your policy and you assume more financial risk. Once your deductible is met (meaning you have paid, in this example, $1000 towards your medical care), your benefits begin to kick in.

However, just because you’ve met your deductible doesn’t automatically mean that your insurance plan will cover the rest of your medical bills in full. Most plans have what’s known as an out-of-pocket limit (this is sometimes also called a stop-loss or break point – these terms all mean the same thing). This limit is the maximum amount you’ll be required to pay for any given benefit period – the maximum amount of money that will come “out of your pocket.” If you’re responsible for 100% of your medical costs up to your deductible, and the insurance company is responsible for 100% of your costs over your out-of-pocket limit – but what about in between, above your deductible but below your out-of-pocket limit? This is where coinsurance comes in. Say you have a 20% coinsurance on your policy – you will be responsible for 20% of the cost of your bill and the insurance company will be responsible for 80% of your bill until you have paid enough money out of your own pocket that your out-of-pocket limit is reached.

This is just the beginning – health insurance can be very complicated, and having your own independent agent on your side can help you navigate these tricky waters. In the following articles, we’ll delve a little deeper into the nuances of health insurance. In the meantime, there’s no need to wait to save on your monthly health insurance premiums. Visit our free Georgia insurance quote page to get your personalized health insurance proposal today and see just how much money you could be saving!

Health Insurance 101 is a post from: Georgia Insurance Options

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.