Annual Disenrollment Period is Around the Corner

Senior Product Specialist, John Shinn discusses the upcoming Annual Disenrollment Period

Today is the end of the Annual Enrollment Period and we’re coming up to the Annual Disenrollment Period. We get a lot of questions on this, and want to make sure that all of you get the answers. The Medicare Advantage disenrollment period is when you can disenroll from a Medicare Advantage and return to Original Medicare. This period of time happens every year at the same time, from January 1st through February 14th. So you can change your Medicare Advantage over to to a Medicare Supplement, back to the Original Medicare.

What you can and cannot do during the Annual Disenrollment Period

There are a couple things you can do, and a couple of things you can’t do. One is that you can only enroll and disenroll in a Medicare Advantage during certain times of the year. We all know that, I think. During the Medicare Advantage disenrollment period. A few things you can leave your Medicare Advantage like I just said, and return to Original Medicare. Really no matter how long you’ve been enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan.

Number two, another thing that is important to know is if you’ve you’ve just recently joined a Medicare Advantage plan in the last couple of months in the Annual Enrollment Period, and then later change your mind, you can change and go back to Original Medicare. A lot of people don’t really know that, they think they’re locked in for another year but you can change your mind if you’ve recently enrolled in  Medicare Advantage.

Effective Dates

The Disenrollment Period from your Medicare Advantage plan goes into effect the first of the month, after you make the request. So that’s important for you to know. For example, if you disenroll from your plan in February, it won’t go into effect until March the 1st. So that’s an important thing, and you pay close attention to the date. Your Medicare Advantage Disenrollment becomes effective because that’s tied into  your network providers and you will make sure that you continue to use the network providers that are in your Medicare Advantage plan.

Until you receive your new effective date. If you leave your Medicare Advantage plan during this Disenrollment Period, you can also enroll in the stand alone prescription drug plan. This is regardless of whether you have a prescription plan on your Medicare Advantage or not. Some people have Medicare Advantage with prescription drugs, and some people have just a Medicare Advantage. You can enroll in a stand alone Medicare prescription drug plan during the Annual Disenrollment as well.

Plans

So if you’re in a Medicare Advantage prescription drug plan you can either submit a dissenrollment notice request to your plan or you can just enroll in a standalone prescription drug plan. And that’s going to automatically disenroll you from your Medicare Advantage plan. A lot of rules to remember, but it’s actually pretty simple. So you have your Annual Enrollment Period that we’re all aware of, that goes on in the fall of the year. And then right after that in January, from January 1st through February 14th You can disenroll in that enrollment period.

So keep in mind that the Original Medicare doesn’t come with prescription drug plans. If you go without a prescription drug plan you’ll have a penalty that you may have to pay. It’s important to remember you have to add a prescription drug plan within 63 days of leaving your Medicare Advantage plan. So if you have other prescription drug coverage, you need to make sure that it’s creditable. Meaning that it’s as good as Original Medicare Part D coverage, or you’ll face a penalty.

Disenrollment Period Guidelines

So let’s talk briefly about what you cannot do during this period of time. You can’t use the Medicare Disenrollment Period to join or switch plans. So if you have a Medicare Advantage plan and you want to join a new plan, or switch plans, you cannot do that during the Disenrollment Period. A note to keep in mind, I made myself a note here,  that during this Disenrollment Period, it’s different from the Annual Enrollment Period that we all hear about in the fall. During the Annual Enrollment Period, that’s the time that you can enroll in a new Medicare Advantage plan, switch plans, make changes to your prescription drug plan, or disenroll from a Medicare Advantage plan and return to Original Medicare. That’s the time of year for that. Also, the Medicare Advantage plan is a separate period from your Initial Coverage, or Election Period. That’s when you’re just turning 65, and you’ve enrolled in Medicare, that’s a different in period.

Outside of these periods of time you can’t make changes to your Medicare Advantage plan. Unless you have a special election period, if you move or something like that, there is a special election so there are different periods of time when you’re involved with Medicare Advantage plans.

We’re just about to come up on this, the Annual Medicare Disenrollment Period. That’s the reason I wanted to come to you today. Hopefully this gives you a little bit of information about what this is all about. It’s a good time of the year, if you change your mind and you decide that you want to go back to the Original Medicare, and possibly add a Medicare Supplement prescription.
This the best time of year to do that.

Got Medicare Questions?

We hope that this information on disenrollement periods is useful to you.

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See our other websites:

EmpowerHealthInsuranceUSA.com

EmpowerMedicareSupplement.com

EmpowerMedicareAdvantage.com