subject: Buying Medical Insurance Don't Get Scammed [print this page] To keep from getting scammed when you purchase medical insurance ascertain that you buy from a company that is accepted by your state's department of insurance, that has few complaints, is financially strong and that has will sell you a good contract.
The first and most important thing you should do before purchasing any health care insurance is to check with your state's insurance department to ascertain that the carrier is approved to sell in your state.
Each department of insurance will have different standards. For this reason, you cannot stop with this step. However, you will eliminate the worst companies from consideration by restricting the carriers you consider to companies that have been accepted by your state's department of insurance.
The ratio of complaints a carrier receives to the number of plan holders is important. Your state's department of insurance should be able to help with this..
To make sure that your insurance department's standards are high enough, you may want to visit the AM Best website to see how financially stable an insurance carrier is. You get a free report on their website that includes not only AM Best's opinion of their current financial stability but also A M Best's opinion of a company's future financial stability.
Ascertaining how strong an insurance contract is can be more difficult than ascertaining how strong the company is. Insurance carriers sometimes sell both good policies and bad ones. Another is the fact the insurance policies are inherently complex.
The percentage of plan holders who complain is a good indication of how good the insurance company's plans are. While some complaints are baseless, a company that has too many complaints is a carrier that either doesn't live up to their promises or that offers policies that don't meet their policyholders expectations.
However, since companies that have a low level of complaints may sell both benefit rich and not so good plans, each contract will need to be looked at independently. Things to stay away from are health insurance policies with low lifetime limits, annual limitations on benefits and limited benefits in the doctor's office.
A plan's lifetime limit should be several million as a minimum unless you are certain you will be switching to another contract soon. If you are close to being eligible for Medicare a plan with a one million dollar cap won't have much time to be ravaged by inflation. If you are younger, a million dollar limit may not be enough when you older.
Some policies have generous lifetime limitations, but limit what they will pay in a 12-month period. These contracts should be avoided. They won't pay all medical bills if you have a major accident or illness.
Policies that pay in the hospital only are not recommended either. If you have major expenses in the hospital you are almost sure to also have some very substantial doctor costs either before or after your hospital stay. You may have a need for multiple doctor visits both before and after a hospital stay.
To avoid being ripped off when you buy medical insurance buying from carriers that pay their claims is important. Of equal importance is buying a plan that meets certain standards. You will need to understand which policies limit their benefits and stay away from them if you want to avoid being ripped-off.
by: Alston Balkcom
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