Take advantage of your health insurance FREE preventative care

Since Obama passed the health care reform in March of last year, in October several new coverages went into place, including now preventative care is covered 100% on all health plans.  If your plan hasn't renewed yet then this may not be available until your next renewal, but either way make sure you take advantage of these FREE preventative services and avoid something more major down the road. 

Click here to see a brochure from SelectHealth on most of the common preventative services covered for FREE!

Changes to getting kids under 19 on an individual health plan

If you have a kid that was declined health insurance on an individual health plan because an adult was not accepted on the plan, the Utah Insurance Department (UID) made an emergency change to the health care law last week.  PLEASE CALL WITH ANY QUESTIONS, BUT PLEASE READ BELOW.  801-505-9960

As you know, the passage of the Affordable Care Act resulted in a number of changes to dependent eligibility, including guaranteed issue for children younger than age 19. In September 2010, the Utah Insurance Department (UID) issued an emergency rule regarding dependent eligibility, including requirements for open enrollment periods.
Last week, the UID made changes to this emergency rule that address child-only plans. Under this new rule, carriers must issue a child-only plan to individuals younger than age 19 who have obtained a certificate of insurability.

To receive a certificate of insurability, an individual must apply with HIPUtah (High Risk Health Insurance Pool). If the individual qualifies for a HIPUtah plan, he or she will be offered HIPUtah coverage. If not, the individual will be issued a certificate of insurability, which must be honored by any commercial carrier in the Utah individual market.

Avoid winter-related disasters

With below freezing temperatures it's probably worth taking some extra steps to protect your home.  Check out this information from the Insurance Information Institute about avoiding winter-related damages to your home.  Click on the title to this article to see the page.



OPEN ENROLLMENT for kids under age 19 that are now guaranteed acceptance on health insurance

Remember that effective this September that the first set of healthcare legislation went into force, and kids under age 19 are guaranteed acceptance on individual/family health plans.  So if you applied for health insurance in the past and one of your kids was declined coverage, then most carriers are only allowing to add them back onto your plan on your policy renewal, which most plans renew the first of January or July. 

There is a catch.... at least one parent has to apply and get approved with the child to have them on the plan, and both parent's have to apply and one has to get approved with several companies. 

Let us know if you have any kids under age 19 that you've had problems getting insurance on and want to re-look at these options. 

Know Your Stuff - FREE Home Inventory Software

We recommend all the time to clients to keep an inventory of everything in their home in case they ever have an insurance claim, but most people never get around to doing it because of the hassle.  This software makes it easy, and will really help you inventory your belongings if you have to ever make a claim  Check it out!

Know Your Stuff® – Home Inventory is provided by the Insurance Information Institute's (III) and is a free online home inventory software. This application makes creating and updating your home inventory easy and efficient. And with the free, secure online storage you will have access to your inventory anywhere, any time. You never know when a disaster may strike, but you can be prepared with an up-to-date home inventory.

We hope this helps!  -Insure Pro



Top Vehicle Safety Picks 2010-How does your car stack up?

Top Vehicle Safety Picks 2010-Insurance Institute for Highway Safety


To determine crashworthiness — how well a vehicle protects its occupants in a crash — the Institute rates vehicles good, acceptable, marginal, or poor based on performance in high-speed front and side crash tests, a rollover test, plus evaluations of seat/head restraints for protection against neck injuries in rear impacts. To earn Top Safety Pick for 2010 a vehicle must have good ratings in all four Institute tests. In addition, the winning vehicles must offer electronic stability control.

How to select the best booster for your kids! You need to read this!

Ratings from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety take the guesswork out of selecting boosters for your kids, and get ratings for the top boosters!  Make sure you're using them properly also. 

Have you ever heard of Medical ID Theft?

I had a client last month apply for health insurance and there was a major surgery on her medical records that she didn't have done!  Honestly, how can this even happen right?  Many people think that ID Theft is associated with only financial transactions, but it goes far beyond that with medical, drivers license, social security, and financial ID Theft.  ID Theft is the fastest growing crime in America, but everyone also thinks it will never happen to them right? 

Did you know you can add ID Fraud Protection onto your home policy with most insurance companies?  Call us today and we can show you how inexpensive it is, and if the company we have you with has this important coverage.  If you want a more comprehensive coverage for everyone in the family, including kids, then for about $14/mo you can get one of the best and most comprehensive ID Theft plans on the market!  Call us today and we can help you with that also.

20% Rate Increases on health insurance

We are getting new rates for our individual health insurance plans effective for 10/1/2010, and we are seeing on average 20% rate increases on almost all plans and all companies. 

Why are they going up?  Effective 9/23/2010 the first requirements of the Healthcare Reform bill are hitting insurance plans which include:

1. $0 out-of-pocket and unlimited preventative care (used to have to pay at least a copay)
2. Unlimited lifetime maximum benefits (these used to be $2-5M)
3. Dependents under 26 years old covered whether full-time students or not (used to have to be a full-time student to be covered over 19)
4. One of the primary reasons for the increase is the first stage of guaranteed issue health insurance-under 19 years old is guaranteed issue with NO preexisting clause (used to be underwritten based on health on individual plans, and 1 yr preexisting clause if they didn't have at least 1 year of prior insurance)

So you can't obviously give away coverage for free, so yes there are more coverages, but in turn we are also seeing this first stage of rate increases across the board.  As other requirements begin to hit plans in 2014 (guaranteed issue for all ages, maternity included on individual plans, etc),  I'm afraid that we will continue to see even higher than normal rate increases.  Some changes needed to be made probably, and will help some people, but overall giving away coverage is going to cost someone-and that includes us unfortunately. 

Click here to see more Healthcare Reform resources from our website.  Please call with any questions!

NOW VOTE ON OUR POLL ON THE RIGHT IF YOU APPROVE OF THE HEALTHCARE REFORM BILL?

Utah Health Exchange Now Open for All Utah Companies with 2-50 Employees

Small businesses in Utah now have the ability to offer expanded health coverage choices to their employees while controlling their own health benefit costs.

The Utah Health Exchange, whice had been operating as a pilot program for the past year, is now open for all Utah employer groups with two to fifty individuals.

Employees of participating businesses can use the Exchange to "shop" for health insurance plans that are tailored to their individual needs.  Rather than having one or two options that are pre-selected by their employer, employees can choose from over sixty plans from four of Utah's largest insurance carriers:  Humana, Regence, Select Health, and United Healthcare.

For employers, the Exchange offers access to Utah's new defined contribution insurance market.  With defined contribution, employers simply decided how much to contribute to their employees' health premium.  That defined contribution is then automatically included in the premium calculations as employees shop for plans in the Exchange.

Defined contribution allows businesses to predict and contain benefits costs from year-to-year.  Health plans purchased via the Exchange are also portable between qualified, registered employers, and all plans in the Exchange allow both employers and employees to retain the pre-tax advantages of traditional small group insurance.

For more information on the Exchange, as well as instructions on how businesses can begin the enrollment process, please visit www.exchange.utah.gov or contact us today!