Benefits experts are stating that conventional coverage, such as health maintenance organizations (HMOs) and preferred provider organizations (PPOs), are still the main types of healthcare plans. But more health insurance companies and Texas employers will begin to offer High-Deductible Health Plans (HDHP), with a Health Savings Account (HSA) attached, during upcoming open-enrollment periods. The HSA is a tax-favored savings account that’s combined with a qualifying HDHP. This allows you to deposit tax-deductible funds into an account that you can use to cover medical costs, as well as enabling you to take control of your own health care decisions.
There are a variety of HDHPs available through various insurance companies. The plans are all similar in that they have deductibles between $1,100 and $5,500 for individuals, and between $2,200 and $11,000 for families. An HDHP with an HSA provides major medical coverage and a tax-free way to help you build savings for future medical expenses. It also gives you greater flexibility and discretion over how you use your health care benefits.
The HDHP also features higher annual deductibles – a minimum of $1,100 for individual coverage and $2,200 for family coverage – than other traditional health plans. The maximum amount out-of-pocket limit for HDHPs, in 2007, is $5,500 for individuals and $11,000 for family enrollment. Depending on the HDHP you purchase, you may have the choice of using in-network and out-of-network providers. Using in-network providers will save you money. With the exception of preventive care, you must meet the annual deductible before the plan pays benefits. Preventive care services may be paid as first dollar coverage or after a small deductible, or co-payment. A maximum dollar amount – up to $300, for instance – may apply.
When you enroll in an HDHP at work, it may be coupled with an HSA or a Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA), the latter of which is funded solely by the employer. As with an HSA, your HRA balance will roll over from year to year, but, unlike an HSA, employees don’t own the fund. So if you leave the company, you can’t take your HRA funds with you or roll them over into new accounts.
HSA plans have not been as widely accepted as was expected when they began to be introduced three years ago. But this year, it is expected that more big companies in Texas will offer them as a health insurance option, and many smaller, cash-strapped businesses will replace their current plans making it the only health-care choice.
With the wide variety of HDHPs and HSAs available today, and the growing administrative and financial burdens of the group health insurance marketplace, Texans need to make sure they have the right plan for themselves.
Melih Oztalay
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/the-high-deductible-health-plan-what-is-it-and-how-does-it-benefit-me-118867.html
Does the CEO of Whole Foods have a better Health Reform plan than Congress?The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare
Eight things we can do to improve health care without adding to the deficit.
8/11/09
By JOHN MACKEY
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money."
—Margaret Thatcher
Highlights:
•Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). Our plan’s costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.
•Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits.
•Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines.
•Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.
•Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year.
•Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost.
•Enact Medicare reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.
•Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance.
Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter.
At Whole Foods we allow our team members to vote on what benefits they most want the company to fund. Our Canadian and British employees express their benefit preferences very clearly—they want supplemental health-care dollars that they can control and spend themselves without permission from their governments. Why would they want such additional health-care benefit dollars if they already have an "intrinsic right to health care"?
Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices.
what does he know? all he did was take a handful of supermarkets and turned it into a multimillion dollar business, obama knows whats best for the country, he spent countless days and evenings hanging out on peoples front lawns with his megaphone and acorn buddies, without fail till people changed there minds in the name of change till he had to surrender his lawyers license before he got disbarred.
obamacare is the way to go whats a few trillion of others peoples moneys as long as we know its comming right back at us in higher taxes.References :
After I initially commented I clicked the -Notify me when new comments are added- checkbox and now each time a remark is added I get 4 emails with the identical comment. Is there any way you may take away me from that service? Thanks!