Limited benefit insurance plans

These days, when medical treatment has become very expensive and to get a good health insurance plan is costly too, everyone is looking for the way to save money. Some people discovered that obtaining a cheap health insurance is the way out, although be careful doing that, because you might get a pig in a poke.

For people in Dallas, or Huston or somewhere else in Texas, a policy called “Limited Benefit” sounds pretty good, with its premiums as low as $10 a week. However, its is a no-win situation, because these policies pay only $1000 dollars a year or 10,000 dollars for the whole life. Those amounts are so little that some experts question whether it can be called insurance coverage at all.

Moreover, insurance agents doubt such plans too. There was a situation about a year ago when during the meeting at one of the insurance companies, all the agents, which attended it, started laughing when the executive told about the Limited Benefit Plan. However, supporters of such insurance plans say that small health coverage is still better than none.

Limited Benefit policies are the fastest growing offerings for hourly workers. It is sold by half a dozen insurance companies and provides coverage for about 750,000 employees and their family members. Such corporations as McDonalds, Wal-Mart are among the companies that offer these plans to their workers. There are about 47 million uninsured people in the USA, and having a Limited Benefit health insurance plan would be better than not having one at all.

You should be aware that Limited Benefit plans put significant financial limitations and caps on such benefits as inpatient care, hospital room and other important services. So why are those policies sold in such tremendous amounts? One of the reasons is that those policies often cover at least part of the every day medical expenses. Although they have restrictions, such as waiting periods and exclusions for people with pre-existing conditions. Limited Benefit plans have deductibles that the insured has to pay every year before the policy starts acting.

Some insurance companies decided to offer low-cost policies (instead of the Limited Benefit) that could cover “catastrophic” health costs, however those plans require large deductibles (couple of thousand dollars), and low-income individuals didn’t show large interest to them.

The enrollment in the Limited Benefit plans has increased by 20% throughout the last year. Most of the times, employers make plans available to hourly workers, and collect premium payments through the payroll deduction. According to the statistic, from 10 to 30 percent of people that work for companies in the service sector usually prefer obtaining the Limited Benefit coverage.

Limited Benefit plans are gaining their place in the today’s insurance market, but it’s extremely important for consumers to understand what they get by purchasing one of these plans.