On Wed, Sep 17, 2008 at 2:42 PM, Jeremy <tclug at lizakowski.com> wrote: > > Rescinding a policy? Just because they feel like it? > > Yes and no to they can do it whenever they feel like it. Here's some quick hits to read on what's been going on over the years. http://attorneypages.com/hot/trigger-health-insurance-rescission.htm http://attorneypages.com/hot/health-insurance-rescission-spells-trouble.htm http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20186938/ http://sacramento.bizjournals.com/sacramento/stories/2008/07/21/story13.html http://money.cnn.com/2007/02/12/magazines/moneymag/insurance_rescission.moneymag/index.htm http://law.freeadvice.com/insurance_law/insurers_bad_faith/blue-cross-rescission.htm In short, they can come up with whatever reason they want to for rescinding your policy so long as they make it look good. They can claim that you falsified information, willfully withheld information, had forgotten about a visit to the ER for a broken toe, forgot to dot your "i" or, cross a "t", etc. In my own case, I called and complained to the state. When I gave the reasons stated for the canceling of my policy, the people I talked to said the insurance company did nothing wrong. There's no legal recourse I can take because they claimed it wasn't "illegal" but certain wasn't "ethical" for them cancel as they did. I can file a complaint. But, that's all I can do (besides paying off my medical bills). So, I got screwed by the insurance company. They refunded my premiums (about $1,100) and stuck me with many times that in medical bills related to health problems that came up while I was covered under their policy. As someone mentioned, it's best if you have a spouse who works full time that can get employer sponsored health insurance if you're going the route of self employment. If not, you have two chioces: 1) Apply to the various health insurance companies. Once you're accepted, hope you don't get rescinded should you have to go to the Dr's office. 2) Take the money that you would pay to health insurance and bank it for health only should you need it. Downside to this is that as far as I know, you cannot claim this like an HSA account. In order to have an HSA, you must have a qualifying health insurance plan. Either way, you're most likely going to have to foot the bills. When I had my health insurance coverage for a family of three, my annual deductible was $5250. Meaning, I had to pay out of pocket up to the deductible before it was covered. Sure, I could use the money I put into the HSA, but that also defeated the purpose of having it IMO. Because the money you deposited into the HSA was deductible as was the money you spent on medical expenses (so long as they met IRS requirements). -- -Shawn -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mailman.mn-linux.org/pipermail/tclug-list/attachments/20080917/e2b6d1c3/attachment.htm