
Tax Credits - Do you Qualify?
Are you looking for help to pay your health insurance premium? Do you qualify for tax credits? Sometimes it can be hard to figure out, so here are some guidelines. In general, there are two benchmarks you must meet in order to receive tax credits. Is your household income less than 400% of the Federal Poverty Level? Does a Silver plan insurance premium cost more than 10% of your monthly gross income? The answer to both of these questions must be yes in order to get tax cred

Open Enrollment Tips - All together now.
Over the past week I've gone over a number of tips to ensure that you are prepared for open enrollment. Here are all of the posts in one place: 1. Verify your user name and password 2. Check your personal contact information 3. Determine your 2018 household income 4. Determine if your plan is being discontinued 5. Make a list of your doctors, providers, hospitals and prescriptions As I post more tips I will continue to update this post so that you can use it as a refere

Open Enrollment Tip #5: Doctors, and Drugs, and Facilities, oh my!
So far we've made sure you can logon to WAHealthPlanFinder.org, made sure your personal and income information is up to date, and checked to see if you are required to find a new plan. We are making our way down the yellow brick road, and it is now time to face the lions and tigers and bears! Well, ok, doctors and drugs and facilities may not be that scary, but they can sure be frustrating! There are NO large network PPO plans being offered on the individual market in Washin

Open Enrollment Tip #4: It's a Disco Party!
Are you ready to Disco? Unfortunately, this isn't the white-leisure-suit-dance-party type of disco. Disco is short for discontinuation, or discontinuation letters - in other words, the letter that is sent to you when your insurance plan will no longer be offered next year. Insurance carriers are required to send disco letters to all members who have a plan that will not be renewed. They must give you 90 days notice, so if this applies to you, you should have received a let

Open Enrollment Tip #3: Psst, buddy, can you spare a dime?
Open Enrollment starts on November 1, 2017. Paying for health insurance may feel like you need to dig under the couch cushions for spare change. TIP #3: Start thinking about your household income now. Check your total income on the My Household tab on WAHealthPlanFinder.org The total income should include the gross wages for everyone in your household after any eligible deductions (student loan interest is a common deduction) If your income is inaccurate, or if it will chan

Open Enrollment Tip #2: Update Your Contact Info
Open Enrollment for 2018 starts three weeks from today! Are you getting prepared? Yesterday we discussed logging on to the WAHealthPlanFinder.org to make sure that you still knew your user name and password. So now what? Tip #2: Make sure all of your contact information is up-to-date. Logon to WAHealthPlanFinder.org From your Dashboard, click on the tab for My Profile. This page allows you to verify and update all your important contact information: Password Email Notificat

Open Enrollment is Coming! Uh, what was my User Name???
Open Enrollment is just a few weeks away. Over the next few weeks we will be discussing ways to help you navigate your options and keep the confusion to a minimum. This is the first in a series of short blog posts with tips on how to prepare for Open Enrollment. While most of these tips are geared towards Washington state's WAHealthPlanFinder.org, they should apply to HealthCare.gov as well. If you are like most folks, you probably haven't logged on to your account for mon