Medicare Annual Enrollment 2025 ¦ Important Updates

The Medicare enrollment period starting October 15, 2024 will be the most disruptive Medicare enrollment period ever. Most insurance companies are canceling some of their Medicare Part D and Medicare Advantage plans in some areas and just walking away, leaving the consumer without coverage. Others are raising prices like this. In this video, I'll show you what you need to do to protect yourself for 2025. In addition, we will go over who among you can get a free ride into a guaranteed issue Medicare supplement because of this year's disruptive enrollment. October 15th through December 7th is the Medicare Annual Enrollment Period, also called the Annual Election Period or AEP for short. This is the period of time that you have to shop for 2025 Medicare Prescription Drug or Medicare Advantage plans. But historically, only 2 out of 10 people even bother to look at next year's plans. They just rely on their plan rolling over for the new year. If that happens this year, we will have hundreds of thousands of people without Medicare Advantage or Part D coverage in 2025 or with plans that cost way over their budget. If you have a Medicare Part D plan or Advantage plan with Aetna, Cigna, WellCare, Mutual of Omaha, Humana, United Healthcare or other major insurance companies, you'll want to pay attention to this video. Interestingly, many people will have the opportunity of a lifetime to improve their Medicare coverage and get into a guaranteed issue Medicare supplement. For the enrollment period, why only Part D plans and Medicare Advantage plans? Why not Medicare supplement plans? Because both Medicare Advantage plans and Medicare Part D plans are annual non-renewable plans. Their contracted benefits and premiums end on December 31st of each year. Next year's plans will always be different than this year's plans and there's no guarantee that the plan will even continue. That's why you have a period of time every year like AEP where you can shop the new plans and choose the one that's best for your needs and your budget. Now this will not impact Medicare supplement plans because Medicare supplement plan benefits never change and they don't renew by calendar year. They renew on your policy anniversary and will continue with benefits unchanged until you cancel the plan. That is why there's no national annual enrollment period for Medicare supplement plans. The annual enrollment period can be confusing for anybody, so let's make sense of all of this and show you what you need to do during the annual enrollment period. Hi, I'm Matthew Clausen with MedigapSeminars.org. We are an independent insurance broker helping people with their Medicare and retirement needs in 49 states from Hawaii to Virginia and Alaska down to the Florida Keys. We are a true independent insurance broker and that means that we work with all the major insurance companies and offer all Medicare supplement plans. Most of all, we represent your best interest, not that of any insurance company, and our services are free to you, the consumer. Check out our five-star ratings, then contact us. You'll be glad you did. If you already have Medicare, then no matter when you started Medicare and which plan you chose, this Medicare annual enrollment period will be very important. The annual enrollment or election period starts on October 15th and runs through December 7th, Pearl Harbor Day each year. During this window of time, you can view the next year's plans benefits, in this case 2025, for Medicare Part D plans and Medicare Advantage plans and choose which one will be best for you for the year ahead. During the annual enrollment period, you have four options for what you can do. You can change from one Medicare Advantage plan to another or from one Part D plan to another or move from original Medicare to an Advantage plan or from an Advantage plan back to original Medicare and apply for a supplement on a Part D plan. If you'll be new to Medicare during this enrollment period, you can ignore this annual election or annual enrollment period. It's not for you. The same if you'll be starting your Medicare next year after AEP. The annual election period is only for people who already have either an Advantage plan or Part D prescription drug plan or already have original Medicare and want to switch to an Advantage plan or add a Part D plan. What makes this Medicare enrollment period for 2025 plans the most important enrollment period ever for Medicare beneficiaries? Simply put, due to the changes in Medicare from the Inflation Reduction Act, almost all Medicare Advantage and Part D insurance companies are canceling some of their plans in some areas of the country and they're closing up shop. They're leaving their policy holders high and dry. Even with those that are not shut down, price and benefit changes are more significant than anything I've ever seen. So let's start with what to do if your 2025 plan is nothing like your 2024 plan, but maybe the insurance company has not dropped Medicare in your state. What should you do? What happens if you don't? And then I will cover the same if your plan was canceled and the insurance company is no longer offering Medicare in your area. Lastly, I'll go over some of the changes or adjustments that my agency have had to make because of this mess. So this is an example sent to me by a client of what's happening with many who own a low price Part D plan. This is from a notice of change sent to me by one of my clients. Note the $5.20 monthly premium is increasing to $49.52 for 2025. That's almost an 800% increase. Also notice the deductible is increasing from $280 deductible for Tier 2 through Tier 5 drugs with Tier 1 being exempt to a $590 annual deductible with no tier exemption. There are other cost increases as well, but suffice it to say this is serious sticker shock. So what should this person do? Well, they should go on the PartDShopper.com and reshop their Medicare plan starting on October 15th. In this case, it's a Part D plan, but similar changes are happening to Medicare Advantage plan benefits as well. If this person does nothing, then the higher price plan will be their plan for 2025. They can change plans between October 15th and December 7th. They are stuck with whatever plan that they chose last by midnight on December 7th. In other words, you can change your mind a few times, but whatever your last application is will be the one you have for the next year. In some cases, the insurance company may cancel your plan but automatically put you in a different plan. This is called crosswalking, and it's what's being done in the example that I just showed. The insurance company is allowed to do this because most people do not reshop their Advantage plan or Part D plan, and this way the consumer at least has something for the next year. Plus, the insurance company keeps the business. But what about the Medicare Advantage and Part D plans that are being canceled and not crosswalked to another plan? Here's a headline from Newsweek. More than 500,000 Americans set to lose their Medicare Advantage plans. Now this article only refers to Humana clients in the 13 areas that Humana is leaving. Recent estimates point to Humana's decision alone actually impacting closer to 600,000 people, and that doesn't include WellCare, who's closing down in six states, or Aetna, who's also closing down Medicare Advantage plans in many states, or Cigna, who's doing the same, and so on. Some major insurance companies have estimated that they're closing down 10% of their Medicare Advantage business. I don't have accurate percentages on how many Part D prescription drug plans are closing, but I believe from what I've seen it's actually a greater percentage. If you have a Part D prescription drug plan that is closing and the insurance company is no longer offering Part D plans in your area, you will be without a Part D plan in 2025 unless you enroll in a different Part D plan during this annual election period. If you miss the window that closes on December 7th, you're out of luck. Go to PartDShopper.com between October 15th and December 7th to shop for the 2025 Part D plans no matter what. Now even if you're not sure if your Part D plan will change, take a look, reshop your plan. Now those with Medicare Advantage plans where the insurance company is closing your plan and maybe leaving your market or state, you have two options available to you, and this is good news. Of course you can shop for a different Medicare Advantage plan. We can help with that. We don't offer all the plans in Medicare, by the way. There are over 3,000 plans, but we can help you find a plan that fits your needs and your budget. Now you need to do this during the annual election period or you will not have an Advantage plan as of January 1. So that's option number one. The second option is to use this opportunity to get a guaranteed issue Medicare Supplement plan. Because your Medicare Advantage plan is closing, you have the right to a guaranteed issued Medicare Supplement. Now this is important. You'll need to provide a copy of the letter from the insurance company stating that your plan is canceled. We call it a disenrollment letter. You either have or will shortly receive that letter from the insurance company stating that your plan is canceled. Keep that letter. That is your golden ticket for a guaranteed issue Medicare Supplement. As a guaranteed issue, if you were eligible for Medicare prior to 2020, you can choose between a Medicare Supplement Plan F, a Plan F High Deductible, Medicare Supplement Plans A, Plans B, Plan C, Plan K, or Plan L. If you were first eligible for Medicare in 2020 or after, you can choose between a Medicare Supplement Plan G, Plan G High Deductible, a Medicare Supplement Plan A, Plan B, Plan D, K, or Plan L. Notice that you cannot get a Plan N. Plan N is only available through Medicare underwriting in this case. So feel free to reach out to us if we can help. That's what we do. To be transparent, there are only a few states where insurance companies are required to compensate agents for guaranteed issue plans. But we will steer you in the right direction. We're going to offer you our guidance regardless. So let's look at some specific company news about all of this. I don't have all of the information I would like, and I'm also restricted on what I can say until October. I have to speak in generalities. So first, for Part D prescription drug plans, WellCare is closing down and moving out of several states. I believe it's six states. Aetna is closing two Part D plans and crosswalking those people into their last remaining Part D plan. You just saw an example of that earlier. They had three Part D plan options for 2024 and earlier. For 2025, only one plan will be available, and the premium is much, much higher and the benefits much lower than what you might have been used to if you had an Aetna plan previously. Mutual of Omaha is out of the Part D business entirely. All Mutual of Omaha Part D plans are canceled for 2025. UnitedHealthcare is closing down one of their three plans and crosswalking those people into one of the other two remaining plans. Cigna will have three plan choices for consumers, but they are different than 2025 than they were in 2024. Humana will have only one prescription drug plan available instead of three, at least in many states. There are others, but you should get the point that you must chop your Part D plan this year. I just can't stress that enough. For Medicare Advantage, the issue is the same. Most, but not all, major insurance companies are closing down about 10 percent of their Advantage plans. Those that remain typically have fewer benefits than the plans that were canceled. So what are we at Medigap Seminars Insurance Agency doing with all of this? How is this impacting us directly? Well, before I answer that, please take a moment to like this video and subscribe to my channel. One other major issue for us, and it is a major issue for us, is that WellCare and Aetna are both no longer compensating independent insurance agents for our Part D business. In other words, they will not compensate us for our business. So we're not offering Part D plans from those companies this year. Now, I don't mind that WellCare is not compensating us because I've had so many complaints about them and such a difficult time with their customer service, if that's what you want to call it, that I'd already made the decision not to work with them in 2025 and beyond. I made that decision a long time ago. But Aetna, well, I like Aetna and I'd still offer their plans if they'd compensate us for the time and an effort. That one's disappointing. To wrap this up, Medicare statistics show that only about 20 percent of Medicare Advantage plan customers and Part D plan customers shop their plan each year. If that happens this year, there'll be a lot of people hurting in 2025. No matter where you shop, on PartDShopper.com or direct with Medicare, please shop your Medicare Advantage and Part D plans between October 15th and December 7th. Please let me know if you found this video helpful. We make these videos for you. Please like, subscribe, and share this video if you think that others will want to hear what I have to say. So will you shop your Part D or Advantage plan this year? Let me know in the comments below. I'm Matthew Clausen with MedigapSeminars.org. Thank you for watching.