REVscene Automotive Forum - Extended health benefits

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Extended health benefits

Hey guys

Figured this was the right forum to ask...

My current employer has a pretty good extended health/dental plan that my family and I are on. Wife is self-employed so always relied on my benefits.

Considering a new job with a smaller company that doesn't have benefits.

With two kids, dental visits, some prescriptions, I really need benefits.

Done a few online quotes, most seem to use manulife, looking at about 500/month, which is fine. Really curious to know how much that will change after a few dental checkups and prescriptions....

Anyone have any experience in similar situations or advice?

Thanks

I'm self-employed as well, but I pay out of pocket for dental, as I've been advised that it's not really worth the money. Maybe with kids, it might be a different story.

My personal insurance broker has sent me some documents in the past regarding Manulife Flex Care. I'm not sure if it's the same as the online quotes, so I've attached images below. I also have the Guide to FlexCare if that's something you wanted to look at.

Below is taken from an email between my broker and me:

Quote:

In the "Guide" file, you can look under the Table of Contents to find the corresponding pages for two plans: (1) DentalPlus Basic, and (2) DentalPlus Enhanced. Obviously, the Enhanced plan covers more but with higher monthly premiums.

In the "Monthly Premiums" file, you can see that for age < 45, the monthly premium for:

- DentalPlus Basic: $76.90 ($922.80/year)

- DentalPlus Enhanced: $114.10 ($1,369.20/year)

Let's use the Enhanced plan as an example. In the "Guide" file, you can see that they cover 70% of eligible services when you spend up to $1,200, which is$$840$maximum in the first year of your plan. Major dental work cannot be done until the second or third year so you won't gain anything there in your first year. So obviously, if you only rely on using the plan for dental work, you would be$short$($1,369.20 - $840) =$$529.20. Unless you make use of the other coverages which are attached to the plan such as travel insurance, vision care, chiropractor, etc., it would not make much sense for you to get the plan.

Hope that kind of helps. I would recommend speaking to an insurance broker after doing your own research.

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Depending on your wife's self-employed income, it might be worth looking into MyHSA

Quote:

Originally Posted by BIC_BAWS (Post 8974531)

Theres a lot of good info here. Majority of my clients fit int he flexcare family of products from manulife.

Thanks guys
Logged onto my benefit plan, only spending 2k on average yearly not including our totally unnecessary massages.

Flexcare quote coming in at only 200/month and would cover 70% of most of that.

Thanks guys, really wanted some numbers to use if it comes to negotiating salary w/ new employer.

any self employed (assuming incorporated) look into the health spending account option? write off through the corp

topic doesn't apply to me but it is of interest.

i have a company and use HSA for the employees.
basically you can give them a yearly allowance, and they can use it on a variety of different things as they please. the qualifying expenses are much broader and easier to get approved since we the company are paying for all of it anyway.
so if you give them $2k per year, and they use the entire 2k, then the company pays 2k + 10% as the administrative fee.
some employees probably won't come near their limit, so some years it will be cheaper, while with any of the traditional insurers, your yearly expenses do not go down no matter how little your employees use their benefits, it can only go up.
The benefit of using it for myself is that you can expense it, it's pre-tax spending. the downside is that we have to pay 10% on top.

we used to have blue cross but after the first year they wanted 15% more, then the second renewal they wanted 45% more so we said goodbye. HSA is not nearly as good, but at least we can guarantee to our employees that their benefits will not get taken away next year or the year after.

I have a question...

I have benefits through my company and I have $1000 alloted for massages and use all of the $1000 during my benefit year.

My wife also has benefits with her company and I am a dependent on that plan. She has $500 allotted for massages for dependents.

Will I be able to use my full $1000 from my plan, and an additional $500 from her plan?

If yes, I suppose this works for other benefit allotments as well ie. vision, dental, ect. Please let me know as I am new to this.

Sorry for hi-jacking thread -- it looked like there were some really great responses so far.

^Yes, for the scenario that you described, that is how it works. Keep in mind each person has to use their own plan first before using their spouse's.

You can also 'split' - known as coordination of benefits, if necessary.

A lot of plans will have a few different numbers for each service. Pretend your plan covers 90% of massage sessions, to $100 per session, to $1,000 annually. If one massage session is $120, even though 90% of $120 is $108, your plan will only $100 (max per sesh). Then you'd claim the remaining $20 from your wife's plan.