We have since it's inception. The first year, it was really cheap.
The next year, the health group for our doctor only accepted insurance from one company, Blue Shield. And each year, the cost has gone up a hundred bucks a month. This coming year, the cost would be over $300.00 (which is cheap for health insurance, for sure). But sales are way off right now. I don't know why, maybe it's because people are afraid to spend money in the current political climate. Whatever it is, we would be hard pressed to come up with that money at this point. Especially since we only go once a year (for me), twice a year (for Brian). We get our annual physicals for no charge, but we're getting bills in the mail for part of the labwork. It was my understanding that routine labwork is covered, but I guess it's not. I could research it, but I'm weary of this shit. I'm just tired.
So, I check the exchange for a different provider and both Sharp and Kaiser Permanente have the same options for a lot less money. I did the comparison thing, where I had the three insurers options listed side by side and Blue Shield was well over $300 more a month. We talked about it and $3600 a year is a lot of money to stay with our doctor.
We're going with Kaiser; the place I said I'd never go to. Comparing ratings between Sharp and Kaiser, Kaiser has much better care and services. So, I cancel the Blue Shield plan, set up Kaiser.
Get my welcome email this morning. I'm told where to send the first month's payment. Of $1180.47.
Yeah, no subsidy was applied. So, I'm on the phone to Kaiser at 6:30 this morning (cool! someone answered and explained it to me). I was given a phone number for Covered Cal, which I called about a half hour ago. Got right through after I listed to all of the freaking options (a lot of options, I started over more than once). "There's a glitch in the system right now, some of the notifications of subsidies aren't getting through to the insurers, call back around December 15 to recheck and if it hasn't gone through, we'll take care of it then" and I was given a reference number.
Sometimes, I really hate adulting.
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