Anyone have experience with a High Deductible Plan??

[clh2]

I have had a high deductible plan for several years.

The thing I liked the most about our plan - my employer adds a certain amount every 3 months into my HSA account. I also like that I am able to use pre-tax dollars to "increase" my HSA.

The things I like the least - the deductible is a family deductible. There isn't a deductible "per-person" and then a family maximum deductible. Be sure that you understand this particular point. Many people at my company do not realize this until they have medical expenses. The other think I do not like is our company added a co-pay of 10%, for a certain amount up to a family maximum OOP.

One thing that I do like - our company started doing 3-options - I can get insurance for "me-only", for "me plus 1-other" or for "me and my family". y employer started instituting a "spousal surcharge", so we had DH get insurance at his employer, it has worked for us - but I do not like having different insurance plans to deal with.

 

[lisalis]

We have this plan and love it, but like a PP commented you need to have a few years of no major medical expenses for it to work smoothly. The first year we had it, my DH replaced a fake tooth he had in front and then I had an unexpected surgery which put us at our limit. We ended up paying the hospital on a payment plan so that we had money to pay for other medical expenses along the way. It took us 2 years to get that paid off. Now, five years down the road we haven't had anything major and we have been able to save up a bit. It works out nice to pay for our DS's braces,and then the next DS who will need braces as well in a few years DH's employer pays the deductible amount each year into our HSA. He does not have a large salary for his position, but they pay all health costs, which makes the entire package very appealing. I like the idea that we can save up $ in our healthy years, so when we retire we will have extra to help defray the costs of medications we may have.

 

[meriface11]

I love my HD plan. We've been in it for 3 years now and we choose this plan over 2 other options. We max out our HSA and had the ability to invest the money in the account nice we reached a certain threshold so the money has actually grown. We have enough money to meet the annual out of pocket max (including deductible) 2 years in a row so we stick to this plan and keep building this account until/unless we start to have health issues that would make one of the other plans more cost effective. I love that we are not flushing money away on premiums that cost more than any actual medical spend we've ever had (and thankful we've been healthy of course) and so happy to be able to put that money into pre tax savings. I can also open a limited purpose FSA account for vision and dental only. I did it this past year to get LASIK.

 

[Debkearsch]

We had it for three years at my previous job and I loved it. We didn't pay anything towards the premium, my employer put $2400 of the $3000 deductible in the HSA account for me, and I added another $1000 to the account. My husband has kidney disease and was on dialysis, so we were guaranteed to meet our out of pocket every year, but it was really only $600 of my money (remember my employer put $2400 in the HSA for me). The best part for me was that once he met his deductible about the second week of January (dialysis is EXPENSIVE) we paid $0 for him the rest of the year. Nothing for drugs, doctors visits, ER visits, $0. Luckily our DD and I are pretty healthy, so we only paid the occasional office visit or antibiotic, and we had the $ for that already in the HSA, tax free, straight from my paycheck. I also learned anytime you have a medical bill, and you have the money to pay it in full, call the provider and bargain with them. Ask, " how much of a discount will you give me to pay this bill in full today?" The answer was never less than 20% and a couple of times as much as 40%. So now even though the deductible was $3000, once you took the MINUMUM 20%, you just saved that $600 of your own money.

Having said that, I do understand that it might not work for everyone, and it was really only so beneficial to me because my employer was putting so much in the account for me. Now, I'm back on a regular plan, $5000 annual max out of pocket and paying almost $400 a month just in premiums. A kidney transplant 14 months has made our lives sooo much better!

 

[EMAW_KSU]

I had one with a previous employer. Wish my current company had one. When I was given the option I entered info into a spread sheet and graphed total cost vs medical cost and premium cost. This is the graph for the first year. My employer put money into the HSA.

 

[Golf4food]

I did one a few years ago just for me. This year we are doing the whole family on the HD savings plan. The only real differences (for us) is the family deductible is $1,000 higher for the HD plan vs the middle level "normal" insurance plan. But the company gives us $800 into our HSA. So in effect, to save over $2,000 per year in premium, our effective deductible is $200 higher. Out of pocket max is the same. (We pay 20% from $3k deductible to the $6k max, they pay 100% after $6k). We are putting the extra $2,200 we need to meet the $3k deductible into the HSA. This will also allow us to meet our full 5% 401K company match contribution level next year and save on taxes since the HSA is pre-tax. Win-win.

 

[photos_101]

Thanks for the thread OP. We have the same decision and I am nervous about making the right/wrong choice.
We have always had very good Ins. but never really use it as we are all healthy so far (knock on wood). So with the new CDHP we would have the potential to bank money but what if??
Our Ind. deductible on the new plan would be $1500pp/$3000 family, then the Ins pays 80%. Our premiums would go down by about $15 every 2 weeks and company gives us $800yr into our HSA.
Our ppo we currently have is $500pp/ $1000 family deductible with very low copays on everything. But premiums would go up by $17 every 2 weeks which is not bad at all considering what others are faced with.

I hate making decisions like this.

 

[toystory1130]

Thanks for the thread OP. We have the same decision and I am nervous about making the right/wrong choice.
We have always had very good Ins. but never really use it as we are all healthy so far (knock on wood). So with the new CDHP we would have the potential to bank money but what if??
Our Ind. deductible on the new plan would be $1500pp/$3000 family, then the Ins pays 80%. Our premiums would go down by about $15 every 2 weeks and company gives us $800yr into our HSA.
Our ppo we currently have is $500pp/ $1000 family deductible with very low copays on everything. But premiums would go up by $17 every 2 weeks which is not bad at all considering what others are faced with.

I hate making decisions like this.

Our new HD plan would also be $1500/$3000 family, then 90% for ours. Our insurance now will go up $74 a month which is why I'm even looking at the HD plan. With my DH high med cost it just doesn't look like we'll get to try it. I sure would like to bank the $$ for retirement years though!