Why Are Medicare Advantage Plans So Controversial? Who Can You Trust?

Today is October the 24th, 2024, and I'm in the studio of MedicareSchool.com's national headquarters in Overland Park, Kansas. We are just a few short days away from a presidential election, and regardless of your party affiliation or your preferred candidate to be the next president of the United States, I think you'd agree with me that this is a very polarizing election. But surprisingly, the presidential election is not the only polarizing topic of the day. Unfortunately, Medicare plans have also become very polarizing. Now, certainly not to the extent of the election, but polarizing nonetheless. But the question is, why would government-sponsored health insurance plans be so polarizing? Well, in this video, I'll explain the reasons why. All right, so let's get into the details of all this polarization surrounding Medicare plans. There's actually five reasons for this polarization. Let's look at each of them. Number one reason is because of all the conflicting information and opinions that exist in the world. Okay, first off, you'll notice this, that there's advice everywhere. Everywhere you turn, someone's going to give you some kind of opinion about Medicare. And so what I did is I went to our site just to show you something. This happens almost every day for us, but I did a video, and the comments started flowing in. Just look at the different opinions about this particular video that I did. Now, you may be able to read this on your phone or your computer, so I'm just going to read it to you. So again, I did a video about Advantage plans, and one comment by Douglas says, the Advantage plan that I chose has a $220 monthly premium, not zero, because some are zero, but this one obviously was not. And this person says, the pay-as-you-go amounts are very low, meaning he realizes that 220 times 12 is going to be spending, what, $2,500, $2,600 a year, and he'd been better by just simply being on a regular supplemental plan. Let's go to the next comment. This person here says, yeah, this video is misleading. I have had a Medicare Advantage PPO plan for nine years. I pay $77 a month for that, plus, of course, the Medicare Part B premium, and have had, watch this, and had first-class care for breast cancer, knee replacement, and rotator cuff surgery. I pay $30 to see a specialist with no referral involved. Now, that's the way it works with PPOs. I've never had a doctor refuse to see me, and every time I have needed a special procedure, MRI, ultrasound, yada, yada, I have gotten it without a referral and in a timely manner. This video is misleading. Years ago, I switched Medi-Cal coverage during open enrollment, and on and on this person goes. Okay, so this was Janet's opinion. By the way, I'm glad that she had that experience, for sure. I'm really glad about it. But then notice, right after that, we have a comment, yeah, they are great. Advantage plans are great until you have a serious health problem, then you're screwed. Great insurance right up until you need it, then you're SOL. I saw a friend wait nearly a year for a pre-approval for a procedure. The condition became much worse while waiting. By the way, I've seen that as well. Waited until the procedure was no longer a viable choice because the condition progressed. All right, again, conflicting opinions for sure. And then down here, Katie writes, I have had multiple inpatient surgeries in over 10 years. I've never had a pre-approval delayed or denied. Now, as I read that comment, I'm aware of the stats on Advantage Plan. And last year, there were 4 million people that had their pre-authorizations denied by the plan. So it happens all the time. In fact, I've had people that were recommended by their doctor to have a knee replacement. Advantage Plan said, no, we don't believe you need that. We want you to go to therapy for nine months. I had a lady who needed a full hip replacement. Advantage Plan said, no, we'll pay for a rod only. So those kinds of things happen. But my point is this, conflicting opinions and difference of opinions about the Medicare Advantage Plan. So let's keep going now. So we know also there's a tremendous amount of misleading information. Again, that's what brings about this confusion. Whenever you see the ads, typically when it's a Medicare Advantage ad, they make you feel like you'd be crazy not to get it or they make you feel like, hey, it's the next best thing since sliced bread. And the problem is what they do, these insurance companies will actually advertise a plan that very few people qualify for, but it's loaded up with all kinds of benefits and looks very attractive. But again, most people can't get that plan. And then when you call in talking about that plan that you heard advertised, they'll say, well, you don't qualify for that. However, we have this other plan for you. That's certainly not going to be near as attractive as the commercial. And the point is they get by with this misleading advertisements all the time. So that also brings confusion and chaos to the market. Number two, we also have agent bias in the Medicare world. And what I mean by that is agents typically are going to prefer Medicare Advantage plans. They want to push them. It's a very easy sell because usually it's going to be a very low or no premium. But also the biggest deal is Medicare Advantage plan pay the agents a high commission. We make twice the money on an Advantage plan and commissions versus a supplemental plan, twice as much. Plus on Advantage plan, if you take that Advantage plan, then we get lifetime renewals. In other words, those plans pay us for a lifetime. As long as you stay on the plan, we continue to get paid, not so with supplemental plans. So the point is the reason for the bias is because the pocketbooks of the agents, we make more money. So agents that are focused on commission only instead of what they should be focused on, which is coverage, making sure you have adequate coverage, the coverage that you would like to have. They'll focus on that, which is going to make them more money. So this happens all the time. And again, they're going to package those as though they're wonderful because they make higher commissions. Number three, also acquaintances. Okay. What I mean by that? I'm talking about your friends, your neighbors, your coworkers, your family members, on and on it goes. All kinds of people are going to have an opinion about Medicare. And so I always say it this way, listen, your neighbor may have done well on that particular plan, but it may be the worst plan for you. You don't have the same health issues, the same health concerns, maybe not the same budget, the same issues that are important to you. So again, we don't just copy off someone else's plan because it worked for them. It may work for you, but it may be the worst option for you. And so what happens is people typically are going to push what they decided on. And we find that people truly love their advantage plan until they may need it. And that was that one particular comment. We've seen people actually, I had an article I read recently about a gentleman that was actually diagnosed with brain cancer. And it took forever to get all those procedures and actually surgery approved by the insurance company, because again, of the preauthorization process. And so the whole point is this, everyone has an opinion about it. And that's what brings the chaos to confusion and the polarization around these plans. All right. That brings us then to reason number two for the polarization. And that is this, you can only folks choose one plan. You cannot be on both plans at the same time. It's one or the other. In fact, as an agent, it's illegal for us to try to put someone that's in one plan into a second plan. So it's one or the other. So we actually only have two choices. You're either going to choose an advantage plan or you're going to choose a Medicare supplemental plan, very much like an election. There may be two candidates and you're going to have to check the box for one, or you have to check the box for the other. So if you choose advantage, you're not getting a supplemental plan. Again, if you choose to go with a supplemental plan, you're not going to get an advantage plan. All right. So we have two options available. All right. Now I want to clarify something as we get into this, because again, I'm going to talk all about the differences of these here in just a second, but I want to remind everyone watching this today that you may have a third option if you or your spouse are still working. Okay. If you're still working, here's the key. If you have an employer-provided plan that's available to you, and let's say you're turning 65. Okay. And you are working for a company that has 20 employees on the payroll or more. Okay. That's considered to be a large group by Medicare. So 20 or more on the payroll. And again, this is your employer, your spouse's employer, and you're covered by that active employment-provided plan. You do not have to do either one of those. Okay. In other words, that's, you don't have to do that at all. You actually can opt for the employer coverage plan again, as long as there's 20 or more on the payroll. All right. So we want to make sure, you know, what I would do if I was you, you're watching this, and this is your scenario where you don't have to use these. I would still take the time to compare your employer option with your Medicare option, because sometimes this may be better than this. Now, sometimes employer plans are very attractive. The premium's great. The network is good. The coverage is good. The co-pays out-of-pocket expenses are wonderful. Maybe your wife or your spouse, your husband or children are covered by the plan, and then you wouldn't want to get off of the plan. But if this is not a real attractive option, then if you're turning 65, that employer has to let you choose one of these two other plans. Now, let me clarify something. If you're in a group, an employer that has 19 or less employees on the payroll, it's a whole different story. Then what happens is you're required to enroll into A and B. Now, as A and B, because they're going to pay first, that employer plan will only pay second. I guarantee you, if you had a large claim and you did not enroll in A and B, when you're in a small group and a claim comes through, that employer plan is only going to pay second. You should have enrolled in a Medicare, and if you didn't, then you will be the first payer. And I've seen it happen multiple times. So you've got to enroll in Medicare A and B if it's 19 or less on the payroll. And then you have to decide what are you going to do Now, what a lot of people do in these small group plans is they just go ahead and drop that, and then we'll choose one of these two options for Medicare. So they come off the group plan and then just choose Medicare only. And so the real question is, which box are you going to check? Remember, you can only check one of those, so you have to decide what's best for you. Hey, if you found this video helpful and you want to see more Medicare information just like it, then go below, right below the video, and you can give us the thumbs up as well as subscribe to And every time I put a new video, which is about two every week, you'll be notified of that video, and others just like you who need this vital information will get it as well. All right, that brings us then to reason number three for the polarization, and that is this, because your decision about Medicare, whether it's an advantage plan, whether it's a supplemental plan, what's happening is it is very, very, very important. Folks, this is a critical choice that you have to make, and you shouldn't take it lightly. We have really devoted our career into this business to make sure we educate people because we know how important this decision is, and you have to live the consequences of the decision. So let's talk about what I mean by all this. First off, it's very important physically to you, meaning when you select this insurance, you have to be concerned about, how is this going to cover me if I have some kind of a chronic condition? How's it going to work? In other words, what are the details of the plan? Because you're physically, you're going to be affected. In fact, they say that many people that don't have adequate insurance oftentimes will delay or just not actually get the care that they need, and so this decision is going to affect you physically. Now, I want to share just a couple of stats with you real quickly. I thought this was very interesting, and this is a report from the CDC about chronic diseases in America. Listen to this. 90% of the nation's $4.5 trillion in annual healthcare expenditures are for people with chronic and mental health conditions, 90% of almost this $4.5 trillion that's spent, and they identify some of these diseases, and the majority of people that have these diseases are those that are on Medicare. Disease number one, heart disease and stroke. This article says this, nothing kills more Americans than heart disease and stroke. More than 944, this is called 950,000 Americans die of heart disease or stroke every year. That's more than one in three deaths. Why? Because of heart attack and stroke, costing our healthcare system $254 billion per year. Number two, cancer. Each year in the United States, 1.7 million people are diagnosed with cancer. I know this to be true. A million of those people will be Medicare eligible, and more than 600,000 die from it, making it the second leading cause of death. The cost of cancer care continues to rise and expected to reach more than $240 billion by 2030. Diabetes, more than 38 million Americans have diabetes, and another 98 million adults in the U.S. have pre-diabetes, which puts them at the risk of having type two. Diabetes can cause serious complications for health, heart disease, kidney failure, blindness, those kinds of things. And then the report goes on to say in 2022, the total estimated cost of diagnosed diabetes was $413 billion in medical cost and lost productivity. Just one more, and this is Alzheimer's. Sadly, Alzheimer's a growing concern right now in our country. It's a progressive brain disease that affects nearly 7 million Americans, including one in nine adults that are 65 and over, again, our Medicare population. Listen to this one. Two-thirds of these older adults are women, 4.2 million of them, so more women getting Alzheimer's than men at the present time. The cost for caring for people with Alzheimer's and other dementia is an estimated $360 billion in 2024. All right, here's the whole point. There's a high probability that we are going to have some physical issues when we go on Medicare, so it's very important that you're conscious of how is my insurance going to work if I happen to have some kind of chronic condition, because again, there's going to be differences here. Now also, let's talk about the financial impact. I just said earlier, they say one in four people actually will not get proper care because they don't have insurance. Now, what's also interesting in America today, they say that 90% of all Americans have some form of health insurance. 90%, only 10% are truly uninsured. All right, but here's the problem. With that 90%, even though we have a high amount of insured people today, presently in our system, there is $220 billion in medical debt, $220 billion in medical debt. Even though 90% of all people have some form of insurance, why in the world would there be $220 billion? Here's why, because what happens is even though we may have insurance, what else do we have still? We have deductibles, we have co-pays, we have co-insurance, right? And so we have some out-of-pocket expenses. Sometimes we have high annual max out-of-pockets, let alone we have prescription medications that we got to pay for as well. We call this cost-sharing. And even though someone may have insurance, they may have a high risk of cost-sharing with their plan. And that's why there was $220 billion in debt. Now, here's what's interesting about this statistic. They say right now that of this, there are 20 million Americans that actually have this $220 billion worth of debt. And what's also interesting is 3 million of this group owe $10,000 or more of that debt, a tremendous amount. In fact, 78% of all those people that owe this are actually in this category right here. They owe more than $10,000. And what's interesting to me is the second largest holder of this medical debt are people that are Medicare eligible. So they certainly had Medicare, but they didn't have other proper insurance. And that's why they're a big part really of this debt problem. So here's my point to you. When you make this decision, it's very important for you physically as well as financially. All right, now we get to reason number four. And again, this is a huge contributor to the polarization of these decisions, Medicare Advantage versus supplemental plans. And so why is it because people that choose to go on Medicare, they're retired or they're getting ready to retire or their group plan's no good. And now they're going on Medicare. What happens when they make these Medicare decisions, they have differing priorities, right? Let's talk through some of the priorities. First off, there are some people that all they care about is how much this plan is going to cost them on a monthly basis. In other words, what's my monthly premiums? In other words, they're trying to get the very least expensive product that they can on a monthly basis. Sometimes they're not thinking about anything beyond the premium, but again, that is a huge deal to some people. That's their priority. What do I have to spend to be on the plan? Number two, we'll have people that not so much concerned about the monthly premiums. What they care about is if I get cancer or I had a heart problem or I had some expensive medication, what will my out of pocket expenses be? That's that cost sharing that we talked about. My liability, what will it cost me? I'm not so concerned about on a monthly basis. I'm more concerned about what's going to cost me throughout the year if I had a serious health issue. That's a priority for some. Others is the quality of insurance, meaning all of us know we get what we pay for and they're not so much concerned about necessarily my premium and my out of pocket. I want to make sure that I have the very best insurance I can get. In other words, they're interested in a comprehensive insurance plan, all right? So they're really thinking big picture, which I think is very smart, but again, a priority. Number four, some people care mostly about prescription drug coverage. Why? Because they know how expensive medications are going to be. Now, I think everyone should care about this to some degree, but for some, this is a critical issue. Now, let me pause here for just a second and make sure we're clear. When you go on Medicare, if you decide to get one of those med sub plans, what happens is we add to that what we call a standalone drug plan, standalone part D plan. It's a plan that you pick out based upon the meds you take and the pharmacy you want to go to. Now, if I decide to get one of the Medicare Advantage plans, what happens, what they do is they actually include it, meaning the Advantage company will include that as part of your package. They pick the plan out. So it's not really specifically designed for you, your meds, your pharmacy. It's rather a one that everyone's going to have within that particular Advantage plan. It doesn't make one good or bad. I'm not saying that. I'm just simply saying there's two different ways we get our meds covered depending upon which box you choose, whether it's something in a plan or an Advantage plan. So subs, it's additional plan. Advantage is included in the package, but that is a priority for some. Number five, also provider choices. I mean by this, what hospitals can I go to? What doctors can I go to? How is my plan going to work? And so again, if that's a priority where someone were to say, hey, I don't want a plan choosing my doctors. I want to go where I want to go. And so when you make this decision, that's a decision you're making to decide whether you want to be in a non-network plan or a network plan. And then lastly here, the perks. Now, when it comes to perks, these are totally Advantage plans. Supplemental plans are all about premium quality insurance. They're not about perks, but Advantage plans have perks and they'll throw in sometimes some dental benefit. We're seeing a lot now that are just some, you know, like preventive services. Some will have preventive plus a little bit of additional comprehensive benefit for extractions, fillings, things like that. But the point is a perk would be a dental allowance built within the plan. A perk would also be a vision allowance. Original Medicare covers a vision very, very well, but it doesn't pay for eyewear. And so some people may want that. Hearing aids, not a part of Medicare. Advantage plans are going to offer that in some degree. Sometimes they'll offer a gym membership or some kind of wellness benefit. So my point is when someone says, Hey, I really care about the perks and that's really the most important thing to me. Well, that's someone that's probably going to check the box and take an Advantage plan. But what I want to teach everyone here in the video is this statement here. I didn't come up with this. This actually is a doctor client of mine. As we were talking about the perks. Now this particular doctor she has since retired. She's my client. She went with the supplemental plan, but as we were discussing the options, of course she knew about Advantage plans and she made this statement and I want to highlight this real quickly. Here's what she said. She says, insurance companies are not, look at this, are not benevolent. And so many times people, they read about the perks, the hearing aids, gym membership, a little dental allowance, a vision allowance. They think these insurance companies are just being benevolent. They're just taking out of their own pockets and giving that benefit to you. That's not what they're doing. Primarily it is marketing and they market people that are primarily healthy that may not even use the insurance yet, but they'll use the perks. And so people are attracted to that. They advertise a zero premium. And again, it's not because, and the doc was right. It's not because they're benevolent. It's because they're great marketers and they're marketing to an audience that may like those perks and therefore they may want to enroll in that particular plan. All right. So my whole point is this, none of these priorities are wrong. I'm just saying to you, one of the reasons for the confusion, the chaos, the polarization of these plans is because different, different people have different priorities. If you come to a place where you know, you're going to have to make some Medicare decisions pretty soon. The best way to do that is to click up here in this right-hand corner, and you'll have an opportunity to book a call with one of our Medicare guides. All the guides around here, I have personally trained and they truly are professional. They'll answer your questions and they'll show you different Medicare options to make sure that you're confident in the decision that you make. All right. So really what you have to do is decide what your priorities are going to be. So let's look at the fifth reason, and that's going to be this. Your two options, notice, are completely different, completely different. In fact, when we compare SUPs to Advantage plans, the only thing they have in common folks is if you check the box and say, I want a supplemental plan, you have got to be enrolled in original Medicare A and B. If you check the box and say, I want Advantage, again, you're going to have to be enrolled in A and B, which means what? Well, for most people, A is going to be a zero premium because you've paid into the Medicare tax system for 40 quarters, 10 years worth of work. But B has a premium. Now next year in 2025, that's going to be $185 a month. This year it's $174.70. So it's going up a little bit in 2025. Okay. So we have to pay that $185 Part B premium. All right. So that's the only thing these two systems have in common. So the point is either way you go here, you're going to have to make that choice. So what I want to teach you is now what is different, because what we're showing you is your insurance is going to work differently in these two systems. Here we go. Let's go through them. So first off, how you pay for your healthcare expenses is going to differ. When I take over here a supplemental plan, again, I've enrolled in A and B. I have a supplemental plan. Most people today are getting a G plan or an N plan. They're both very good options, just a little bit different. G, a little bit more comprehensive. N, less comprehensive, but also a lower cost on a monthly basis. But the point is I have a premium that I pay for my plan. And so let's just say you went with the G plan. The G plan covers all the Medicare gaps, financial liability you have, except one, which would be the B deductible. And so the B deductible this year is $240. We don't know yet what it's going to be in 2025. But the point is you have to meet a deductible once a year on everything on the B side. So 240. After that, everything else would be covered. So as long as you see a Medicare provider and the service you're having done is covered by Medicare, then you have full coverage other than the B deductible. All right. And so that's how you pay for it. You pay a premium to Medicare. You pay a premium to your supplemental company. And then if you have a G plan, you just pay the B deductible and you're going to be done for the whole year. And then that deductible resets every January, and then you got to meet it again. Now, when it comes to the second most popular plan, which is an N plan, again, very good plan. It's going to be a lower cost than the G plan. The N plan, you would be responsible for the B deductible, just like the G. And you'd also be responsible for excess charges if and when they occur. Excess charges don't occur often. They say right now less than 5% of doctors even charge them. But if you were to go to a doctor where they charged excess, that's 15% added to the bill. The N plan will not pay that. G does, N doesn't. So that would be out of pocket for you. Again, it's pretty rare. And then lastly, if I have an N plan, every time you go to the doctor, you're subject to a $20 copay. Go to the emergency room, you're subject to a $50 copay unless you're admitted to the hospital. Point is, N has a lower premium. You take on just a little bit more risk and you have to decide what you're most comfortable with. Either way, we're going to pay premium. We add a drug plan. Again, we got a premium for that. Some of them are very low, some a little bit more expensive. Now, over here on this side, how I pay is this. About 60% of all the advantage plans offered in 2025 have a zero premium. 40% are going to have some premium averages about $20 to $25, very low. And so the reason for that is because instead of paying premiums other than the Medicare, you're going to pay as you go. So you see your primary care doctor, probably $0 to $10 copay. See a specialist, it may be $30 to $50 copay. Go to the hospital, it may cost you $300 to $400 a day up to a certain limit of days, maybe five, six, or seven days. You have an outpatient procedure, you may be responsible for a $300 or $400 copay, an MRI or CAT scan, maybe $250. But the point is, we pay as we go into that system until we hit a max out of pocket. In this system, my max out of pocket is pretty much, especially in the G plan, I pay my premium, I have my B deductible, I'm done. Over here, what happens, depending upon what kind of network you're in, your HMO, you may have a max out of pocket of maybe $3,000 to $5,000 for the year. A PPO, maybe somewhere between $5,000 to $7,000 or $10,000. So that's how we pay. So either way, we pay, but it's just different. All right, you have to decide what you're going to be most comfortable with. Now, secondly, when it comes to provider options, they're definitely different. So if you check the box over here and you take a supplemental plan, you actually can go to any provider as long as they take Medicare. You don't even have to ask them if they take your supplemental plan because they have to. And so as long as they take Medicare, 100% of all hospitals do, 99% of all doctors do, you can pretty much go anywhere you want. There are some providers such as concierge docs that don't take any form of insurance, but the majority of doctors, great majority, are going to take Medicare plans. So you have almost unlimited here. If I check the box and take an advantage plan, not so. Now what's going to happen, I have to pick either an HMO plan or a PPO plan. The HMO plans do have less options. We have more restrictions. There's less providers because they don't, frankly, get paid as much money. And so fewer doctors are willing to be in that network. Again, there's still plenty that will, but there are fewer. Also, sometimes an HMO will require you to see your primary care doctor and get a referral to see a specialist. Also, HMO plans usually will not let you go out of the network unless it's an emergency situation. And so the point is we have some restrictions. PPO plans let you go out of the network as long as the provider takes Medicare, but it costs you more to do so. You pay a tremendous amount more money to be able to go out of the network. So the whole point is advantage plans are network plans with some restrictions and some limitations and rules because of that. Over here, we don't deal with the issue. Number three, also preauthorization is a huge deal today. And again, as we read that one lady had never had a preauthorization issue, which I'm thankful to hear that, but I've heard of many situations and personal clients of mine that had a preauthorization, which means what? If I check the box over here on supplemental plans, I will never have a preauthorization by the insurance company. If Medicare says it's a covered service, doctor says you need it, end of story. You get the service that a supplemental company cannot interfere in any way. They can't delay, they can't deny, they have to follow Medicare. Over here, they say right now that about seven out of 10 services that you need are going to be, there's a preauthorization required, meaning they're mandatory before they're going to cover an MRI or CAT scan, an extended skilled nursing stay, an inpatient or outpatient surgery. They have to approve all that. And again, they're going to approve many times, but sometimes they don't. They delay or they deny that. And that can be very annoying as 4 million people experienced last year. So this system has preauthorizations, that one does not. Number four, policy terms. When you get that supplemental plan, folks, it is a lifetime policy. The insurance company writes it, you've been approved, you have that policy for the rest of your life. Your only requirement, pay the premium. They can never cancel your policy unless you fail to pay the premium. It is truly a lifetime coverage. If you have the G plan, the only thing you're responsible for the whole year, for the rest of your life would be that be deductible, and that's it. They cannot change the terms. They can change the premiums and they will, but as far as the terms of coverage, that can never, ever be changed. It's a lifetime policy. It's a portable policy. If you live, let's say in Seattle, Washington, and you want to move to Dallas, Texas, you take your supplemental plan with you. It's portable. It's tied to you. It's not tied to a certain area. It's tied to you. And when you move, you take supplemental plans with you. So they're truly lifetime policy. Over here, these are not. In fact, many of you who are experiencing changes for Medicare Advantage in 2025, your plan was dropped. Most of the large carriers, they're dropping some of their plans. About 10 to 15% of all the people on Advantage plans this year are going to lose their plan. Insurance companies could not make a profit on the plan. They pulled the plan. They have every right to do that. Why? Because these are one year at a time and that's it. And that's why the consumer can change on an annual basis as well, because sometimes the plans improve. Sometimes they decrease the benefits. Sometimes they raise the co-pays, they change the plans, or sometimes they pull the plan and therefore people have to get a new plan. They're also not tied to you. They're tied to a service area. We have 37 service areas in the country. So if you move from one to another, usually from one metro area to another metro area, you're going to have to get a whole different plan and choose doctors and those kinds of things that go along with that. But the point is, the policy terms are different. And then lastly, and I'm going to close with this, as far as switching plans. When you first go on Medicare and your B date is established, you have six months of your B date before the B date or six months after the B date where you are guaranteed issue. That insurance company that you apply for a supplemental plan has to approve the policy. They have to cover all your preexisting conditions. They can't charge you more because of those conditions. And that six month window, we call the Medigap OEP. Again, six months before your B date and six months after. And then after that, six months is over. If you want to get a supplemental plan in the future, in most states, you now have to medically qualify to get that plan. All right. Exceptions would be New York, Connecticut, Vermont, Maine, and Massachusetts. Everywhere else, you're going to have to qualify. So the point is we have this once in a lifetime opportunity to get the supplemental plan. And if you don't get one, then you may be able to get one, but you've got to go through medical underwriting to do so. Now, when we talk about switching plans with advantage, what we mean by that is that when someone's on an advantage plan and they choose to stay on that advantage plan for a year, three years, five years, 10 years, and then they want to get back over into this system, except in those five states I mentioned, to make the switch from advantage to sup, now they have to medically qualify. We have to ask you 35 to 40 health questions, depending upon the insurance company you selected. We've got to check all your meds you're taking now and the last two years. So we take that medical information, health questions and prescriptions, and give that to the insurance company. And they analyze that and say, okay, do we think this person can medically qualify? They'll approve the policy. If they see something in your medical records or prescription records they don't like, they have every right to deny that policy. And if they deny that, then you cannot make the switch and you'll be in that advantage plan system for the rest of your life. Okay? And so we want to make sure that you understand that these two systems are totally different. And so it's not about, in my opinion, the perks that come with the plan. It's not about just cheap monthly premiums. It's about how is your insurance going to work if you had cancer or you had Alzheimer's, you had some kind of serious disease, you want to make sure that you've got great insurance. Now, if a person cannot afford a premium, then I would tell them for sure, for sure, let's find the very best Medicare advantage plan that you can. But some of you who can afford a little extra money on a monthly basis and pay the premium, I would say, if you can afford that, I think in the longterm, you're going to be very, very pleased with that decision. Again, what I just said is polarizing, because some people have had a great experience here. And I know that I'm glad, and I hope your experience continues to be very good. But I've heard enough stories about these where I know when I go on Medicare, I'm a year and two months away, this is what I'm going to do. I can afford a little extra money, and I'm willing to do that, forego the perks, of course. I'd rather pay a little more money up front to have that quality insurance that's going to last me for the rest of my life.