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I know many will swear its not a good idea, but, for a year we had no insurance as we had pre existing conditions and no employer coverage. However, I found that prescriptions that were $300 under my insurance were $20 when ordered as a generic out of the US. i.e., other countries had generics, US did not. I suppose there is risk there, but, when you have several of those prescriptions, the choice is either pay a couple of thousand a month, which we could not do at the time, or, pay a few hundred a month. We chose the latter. Though we were careful.
We actually got better doctor rates when we had no insurance. Some doctors give you a better deal if they are nice and see you have no insurance. Was quite surprised. I am sure that depends on the doctor though. Thankfully, nothing terrible happened during that year as I would not have wanted to test say a hospital using that logic!
My insurance, not employer covered, went up 24% for 2015 in Oklahoma, same plan. At first, I thought it was all just the premium increase. However, it turns out the majority of that increase was I hit a new age bracket.
And here was another trick.... I went to Walgreens for a prescription a month ago. This is for a very old drug that I was paying $14 for. They said they were not making as much any more, so, new cost was going to be $50, and this is under insurance "discount". So, I went to small town pharmacy also in network. They quoted me the same $50, however, they said I could buy it with no insurance for $18. So, I did. This is BCBS, PPO plan. So, I am not so sure the vaunted discounts are always what they seem any more.
Major change for me. I'm self-employed my insurance company is ending my plan, but they are nice enough to automatically switch me to a "similar" plan that only costs 25% more and changes my deductible from $2500 to $6500
Ours stayed the same, with a $700 deduct and 4500 OOP. Most items are a 90/10 with $20 copay for most Dr. Appt. running $1208/month for the family plan.
I know many will swear its not a good idea, but, for a year we had no insurance as we had pre existing conditions and no employer coverage. However, I found that prescriptions that were $300 under my insurance were $20 when ordered as a generic out of the US. i.e., other countries had generics, US did not. I suppose there is risk there, but, when you have several of those prescriptions, the choice is either pay a couple of thousand a month, which we could not do at the time, or, pay a few hundred a month. We chose the latter. Though we were careful.
We actually got better doctor rates when we had no insurance. Some doctors give you a better deal if they are nice and see you have no insurance. Was quite surprised. I am sure that depends on the doctor though. Thankfully, nothing terrible happened during that year as I would not have wanted to test say a hospital using that logic!
My insurance, not employer covered, went up 24% for 2015 in Oklahoma, same plan. At first, I thought it was all just the premium increase. However, it turns out the majority of that increase was I hit a new age bracket.
And here was another trick.... I went to Walgreens for a prescription a month ago. This is for a very old drug that I was paying $14 for. They said they were not making as much any more, so, new cost was going to be $50, and this is under insurance "discount". So, I went to small town pharmacy also in network. They quoted me the same $50, however, they said I could buy it with no insurance for $18. So, I did. This is BCBS, PPO plan. So, I am not so sure the vaunted discounts are always what they seem any more.
I did that as well. When I had no insurance and was waiting for Medicare to kick in, I ordered generic medication for my seizures and other conditions from India and Canada. Instead of paying over $3000/month for my prescriptions, I paid about $600. It was still nearly impossible for me to pay this much, but meds that are unaffordable beats complete bankruptcy all to pieces
Mine did not change for the most part. They added a cheaper dental plan, but I didn't bother switching to it.
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