A Comparison of Health Insurance to Health Discount Benefits

I would like to say first off that I am a big believer in Insurance. I've been licensed by the state I live in to sell Life and Health and have been an agent for two different very large Insurance Companies. I could mention the names of these companies and everybody reading this would recognize them but for legal reasons I'll leave that off.

Having sold Insurance I have not only heard the horror stories but have also met the people that they have happened to. So as I said before, I am a big believer in Insurance.

My reason for writing this article today is that many people have no idea that there is an alternative or if they are aware of it they don’t really know any details about it or if it compares favorably to health insurance.

The name of this alternative is Health Discount Benefits and today I am going to compare it to Health Insurance side by side so that others can make an educated decision.

First off when you start shopping for Health Insurance you will find that the prices tend to range anywhere from $300 to $800 a month. The price depends some on the company but mostly it is determined by the size of your Deductible, the percentage paid after the deductible has been met, and the max out of pocket per year before the insurance pay’s the balance of the bill. There are also other factors you might want to check such as is maternity covered (this usually adds about $100 $120 a month) or even if some illnesses like cancer are covered. You wouldn’t think this would be an issue but you might be surprised.

Let’s say you decide on a lower priced policy costing around $300 a month. This will have probably at least a $5,000 deductible with you paying 20% to 50% until the Maximum out of pocket has been met. At that point the insurance will pay everything left.

Now before you are covered you have to underwritten. The job of the underwriters is to determine what the chances are that you will actually have to use this policy. Really you might think of insurance as a gamble which you are betting that you will use it and the insurance company is betting that you won’t. Let’s face it, most healthy individuals aren’t going to experience any catastrophic illnesses until after age 65 at which time you are covered by Medicare instead of the Insurance company. There is a chance of a serious accident which is why there is a whole section on the applications about dangerous hobbies and traffic citations. Basically if you are not in good health or they can see reason to believe that you are likely to have a serious accident they will not underwrite the policy or they limit coverage on that policy to not include certain cases.

Don't get me wrong, I know that this sounds very criticle toward the health insurance industry. Even though I sell the competing product, I've got to in all fairness mention that even with these precautions, most health insurance companies only make a profit off about 3% of the premiums. So really they have to work this way in order to stay in business. And let's face it, if there were no profits, there wouldn't be anybody offering the service.

Let’s say though that you are underwritten and that you have an accident the very first year of coverage. At $300 a month your out of pocket cost that year before the insurance kicks in is $3,600 for the premiums plus $5,000 deductible for a total of $8,600. At this point you will only have to pay the 20% to 50% until the maximum out of pocket is paid.

Now what about the Health Discount Benefits. This is a industry that is growing by leaps and bounds. There are several companies providing this benefit, but I know personally about one called Ameriplan which is the largest company providing this benefit so I will use their premiums for examples.

With this benefit you get coverage on Physician Care, Hospital Advocacy, Dental, Vision, Chiropractic, and Prescription. These benefits literally cover everything even procedures that are considered cosmetic. The Vision plan even covers designer sunglasses and Lasic Eye Surgery. And the price for this plan is $39.95 a month.

The reason that this plan is so affordable is that Ameriplan doesn't have to pay medical cost for the members. Basically, in return for providers agreeing to give these discounts to Ameriplan's members, they are sent patients that they would not have had otherwise. This in turn saves them the cost of having to run expensive ads advertising their services.

As far as underwriting goes there isn’t any. This is guaranteed issue. It covers all preexisting conditions, and there isn’t any waiting period. Since is it a Discount Plan, there isn’t any Deductible and you get discounts up to 80%.

Say you have to go to the hospital, the first year. Your out of pocket cost before you get any benefit is $479.40. The amount owed to the hospital is determined by ability to pay. I’ve found where some people haven’t had to pay anything and others had to pay $1,300 out of a $47,000 hospital bill. You might look here for testimonials of individuals who have used this plan.
So I hope this helps. I personally use the Health Discount Plan. $300 to $800 a month is just more than I really want to pay but at the same time I know that I do need coverage in case of something unexpected happening. If your not covered or you are wondering how you are going to afford the coverage that you currently have, I would encourage you to consider Health Discount Benefits.
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