Dallas-Fort Worth Nesties
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Re: SA Wednesday
If you have good insurance, count your blessings. If you have affordable insurance, you probably don't have good insurance. It was going to cost us $500+ a month to add me to DH's policy.
If you don't have insurance - please at least get a cheap individual policy. That way if something catastrophic happens, you will have coverage. You may pay out the wazoo to cover said catastrophic event, but at least in the future any issues surrounding such event will not be uninsurable.
My dad bought one of those for my brother. I think it was $150 a month, but I think my brother has better coverage than I do. My district is going over to the state system (we were self-funded up until now) and we'll be with Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which my family always liked way better than other health insurance providers. I think that's who my dad got for my brother as well. One last example: I have a friend whose elderly husband was going to be that amount that Bill was going to be and he found a plan for himself that is a little more than my brother's plan is.
My company pays for 100% of MY insurance, there is no option to add family members.
Which is cool, very cool that they pay. But I wish I had the option to purchase a better plan through my company... but I don't.
So, basically... it's like get stuck with the blah insurance or go pay 500+/month for the good stuff.
Bio
Any thoughts? http://community.thenest.com/cs/ks/forums/thread/61010229.aspx
I know, I know. My parents have brought this up several times as well. I just keep thinking "well, hopefully in a few months I'll have a full-time job and we'll be covered" but that keeps not happening.
I like it... and I'm not into HP. I think it's a cute name.
Bio
When you get a FT job, it's possible they will make you wait 3-6 months before they will 'pick you up'. You could get an individual policy now and then once they "pick you up," you can drop your individual policy. That way you are always covered.
Our ZeroRez guy was the same way. I can't remember what he talked me into but he was going to count one of our rooms as 2 instead of 1 but then he said he would do another room and the hallways for $X amount which was cheaper than the normal rate. He also tried talking me into doing a 'protection' thing.
Don't beat yourself up about it! You didn't know.I like it. I was actually thinking about some of the names for the new cats that we'll get in a couple of years.
When you get the job at UNT or any of the state universities in Texas, you'll have a 90 day waiting period for health insurance, dental starts the 1st day of the next month. Being covered by health insurance is one of those things that I'm paranoid about and DH makes fun of me but I agree with Lacey, get something!
Have you looked into supplemental insurance? I know nothing about it except for the Aflac commercials, but seems like your situation is one of the reasons it is around.
For those w/out insurance, I have a little story for you. 7 years ago, I was one year out of college and working a contract position (ie- no insurance). I had some crappy plan that you pay a few hundred dollars every 6 months, for emergency medical care. Well, they decided after the second 6 month spam not to renew the plan, I hadn't kept up with when it expired. About two weeks after it expired, I was rollerblading, little kid runs in front of me, I swerve and fall on the grass. Dad yells at kid, says nothing to me, I look down and my forearm is snapped in half. After ER bills, emergency surgery to put a plate in my arm, overnight stay, follow ups to the doctor, and physical therapy I was out over $20k. PLEASE get insurance. You never know what will happen.
Michelle & Michael
Married - August '10
TTC - Since September 2011
Unfortunately, in almost all cases you have to have AFLAC 10 months prior to delivery. This is a good idea for those TTC though, especially if you have a job that offers little in the way of maternity pay.
Nerd! Haha, j/k. I think it's pretty cool, but I like last name type names for first names.
Ah, that makes sense. Well Brianna, for baby # 3 then!
Michelle & Michael
Married - August '10
TTC - Since September 2011
Whoa whoa whoa... you have to catch up to me first! Then, maybe. Lol!
Bio
oh how i miss my military insurance
i loved tricare. Aside from the annoying fact that you could only go to certain places for specialist care it was nice to be able to walk into the ER - spend the night, get xrays, blood work and the whole sha-bang and only have a bill of $20.
Our lawfirm has pretty good insurance though, and they pay a hefty portion of it. So its nice - but i still miss my other insurance lol.
Bri- you should find out when your "renewal" is or whatever its called. Most of the time its Jan. 1. but sometimes its different. it basically restarts the monetary amount you've put towards the max you pay for the year - if its Jan. 1 i'd try to push for your more expensive appt's to be jan. 1 or later (if you can that is). Also, the whole "marriage is a life changing event" thing - is only 30 days with most insurance companys. You have 30 days to get on your spouses plan - after that window you have to wait for the next renewal period. We experienced this with our insurance when we tried to add DH to mine at day 35.
Or maybe you can just hold the baby in until the supplemental insurance kicks in...
ETA: Edited, I originally typed in the wrong 'quotes'.
Our renewal is March - per the insurance company.
I am seeing if they're giving us the option this time to purchase upgrade insurance, because that would trump whatever is currently in place. Fingers crossed.
Bio
HA! We're working on it!
Michelle & Michael
Married - August '10
TTC - Since September 2011
If your renewel is in March your DED and OOP will start over then as well. Sorry! This is literally what I do everyday. I get benefits and prices for surgeries, joy to me who gets to deal with insurance all day. My advice is to get a health fund. You should be able to get a fund that will go before taxes are taken so you can save a little there. Load $6,000 on the card and you are covered for your whole pregnancy and the whole year. Sadly they will take it out of your paycheck every month but at least it's before taxes.
Anna - I would agree with Lacy you need insurance. We had a patient come in the other day who got kicked with a soccer ball, broke his nose and had no insurance. He thought he would be slick and get it a couple days later. When I called to get it all approved and everything we found out what he did. Now he has to pay for all his visits and surgery full rate. We also see a lot of cancer patient's without insurance and that's not where you want to be either.
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I *think* it will be fine. I haven't had any OOP expenses, other than 1 $25 co-pay that I won't have to pay again. I am going to talk to my doctor's office about holding off on any OOP stuff until after March, which I think will be fine. I guess we're just taking this one day at a time.
My benefits person here says that our plan restarts Jan 1 though. So, I'm even more confused.
ETA: And then I looked at the treatment cost estimator on myuhc.com and that said 8k?!? This makes my brain hurt.
Bio
I got really luck with insurance. I pay less than $100 for medical, dental and vision. I have a small copay of $20 at my GP and $40 at specialist. My insurance also covers 95% of all maternity related expenses. I paid $40 for my first appointment and haven't had to pay another penny for a dr visit. I have paid for the doctor during the delivery already and as long as I don't have a c-section I'm done with their bills. It was less than $250 for that bill. The hospital will be more I know but again I'm only paying 5% of all of it and I only have a $2000 deductible. I won't have much of that paid in Feb but we are really impressed so far with how little it has cost.
Aflac, yes you have to have it 10 months prior and they can only take payment if it is deducted from your paycheck. If your company isn't willing to let them deduct it you can't get it. I looked into it all last year knowing we were going to TTC.
Make sure and check on that whole deductible plus OOP expense. I thought I only had a 2k deductible too.
I also only have to pay 1 co-pay total.
Bio
That even confuses me. Did you check your surgery benefits or your maternity benefits? Either way if you need to go over anything I can check it out. I've pretty much figured my way around the insurance world
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If you do this, you might look at getting an HSA (health spending account) versus an FSA (flexible spending account). An HSA will rollover every year. With an FSA you either spend it in the year you contribute it or you lose it. Also, you can roll an HSA over into an IRA.
I don't remember what we had when I started teaching, but halfway through my second year we switched to the Teacher Retirement System insurance, which is through BCBS. Our rates went WAY up, but our coverage is pretty good. I'm having quite a nightmare with my flex spending account, but that's not the insurance's fault. The worst thing for me is my vision insurance. It (like most) hardly pays anything. A few years ago I just dropped it and paid out of pocket (or with my FSA when it wasn't being pissy).
<a href="http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v123/magicwombat/?action=view
Bio
I really wanted to do a HSA this year, but the plan is different and we would have had more OOP expenses. With TTC that didn't seem like a good idea. So we went with a traditional PPO and FSA. I'm hoping in the next year or two we will be able to move over to that. It makes so much more sense to me.
Michelle & Michael
Married - August '10
TTC - Since September 2011
DH has an HSA. It's great. We originally had him on that because he hardly - if ever goes to the doctor for anything. And he's always been pretty healthy.
Since he was going to start hockey again we wanted to move him over to my plan - but we missed the window.
One thing that i will say about the HSA - that neither of us liked. Is that it takes a good chunk out of your tax returns. I originally thought maybe i was doing it wrong, but our 5 other coworkers who use it had a large chunk as well removed. In the grand scheme of things it wasn't much, and i think it was only on the amount of which DH used. but it was still almost $400. So if you're looking into an HSA - research that
It is great in the sense he can use it for just about anything medical - claritin, eye glasses, or a trip to the doc.
Hmm... I not a tax expert by any means, but an HSA is a tax-advantaged account. The money contributed is tax free, it grows tax free and qualified medical expenses are tax free. Did y'all make the contributions or did your employer? My thinking is that if your employer made the contributions, then there may be a tax component there. Maybe Angie will pipe in.