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Special Announcement: Thrivent Medicare Supplement Insurance is Now Available for Sale in Florida! Not contracted with Thrivent? Request Details
AL, GA, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MD, MS, NC, NJ, NV, OK, PA, SC, TN, UT, VA, WV To download current brochures and materials, please visit your Agent Portal at https://aiatpa.agentxcelerator.com/. Log in using your producer code. eApplications make submitting business fast and secure. Simply log into your Agent Portal and click on the 'Start or continue an eApp' link. Ordering paper supplies is easy!
For more information on how to order and track supplies, refer to your agent guide. Not contracted with Thrivent? Request Details |
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Mutual of Omaha MA and PDP Opportunity
Now that you have heard the buzz, let's get down to work! Mutual of Omaha will be in the market this fall with their new Medicare Advantage product in the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky and San Antonio markets and a Prescription Drug Plan product available nationwide, except New York and the U.S. territories. Click on the links to view more details. Here’s what you need to know so you don’t miss out on these great opportunities. There are three steps in being ‘Ready to Sell’ Step 1: Contracting Step 2: AHIP Certification Select: Product – Medicare Solutions – Sales Tools – Product Education – AHIP Training. Receive a $50 discount when completing this training through the Mutual producer portal. Step 3: Product Training Medicare Advantage Prescription Drug Plans MA and PDP training is not state specific. Regardless of the state selected to access the training links, there is only one MA product training module and one PDP training module. IMPORTANT TRAINING INFORMATION
Enrollment Kits When all three steps are complete you will receive a Welcome packet notification via email that you are ‘Ready to Sell.’
Watch Express for further details on ordering additional marketing materials. Don’t miss out – October 1, is just around the corner.
The sooner the better! |
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Tags: Medicare Advantage, Part D, mutual of omaha
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AIG Rate Increase Notification
Important Changes to Guaranteed Issue Whole Life At times, it is necessary to make adjustments to products in order to ensure long-term value for you, your clients, and AIG. For this reason, after a review of our Guaranteed Issue Whole Life (GIWL) product, we will be making the following changes. These changes will apply to all applications received on or after 5PM CST, September 14, 2018.
• Rates: GIWL rates will increase at varying percentages depending upon age and face amount. However; even with this change, our rates will remain competitive in the marketplace. |
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Tags: guarantee issue final expense, aig, guarantee issue whole life
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Your Path to AEP Success
With the AEP right around the corner, now is the time to make sure you are aligned with the right partner. PSM is your one-stop-shop for all the resources you need to ensure a successful AEP. Whether it be a strong portfolio of the industry's leading companies, free quoting and sales technology to increase your sales, or discounts on AHIP training / lead generation, we've got you covered. Your path to success starts here:
Request Information today and we will gladly make sure you are on our list to receive updates. We would also encourage you to call 800-998-7715 and speak with one of our marketers to discuss ideas and we can personalize our services to benefit your business. |
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Tags: Medicare Advantage, Lead Generation, prospecting, AEP, medicare updates, certification, Insurance Technology
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Offer your clients comprehensive dental plan options at an affordable price.
We are excited to offer Ameritas' suite of Individual Dental Plans. Ameritas offers you tremendous selling power with one of the nation's largest dental networks, an award-winning customer service team and a quick and easy enrollment process for your clients. Sell more using the Ameritas PrimeStar Hyperlink:
Request Information today on this new and exciting opportunity. Contracting can be done online in just a few minutes! |
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Connect with us and stay informed! Keep your business informed! The senior insurance market is always changing. Follow us and stay up to date on the latest industry news and updates, as well as some of the leading resources and products available in the senior market. |
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Tags: Social Media Marketing, LinkedIn
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New Med Supp States from Cigna We are excited to announce that Cigna will be releasing their new Medicare Supplement plans insured by Cigna Health and Life Insurance Company (CHLIC) in IA, LA, NJ, NV, TN and UT. Request details today on this exciting opportunity. CHLIC Med Supp is now available in the following states: AL, AZ, CO, CT, GA, ID, IN, IL, KY, KS, MD, MI, MN, MO, MS, NC, OH, OK, PA, SC, SD, TX and WI. |
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The Future of Online Enrollments for
Some of the New enhancements for 2019: When a Broker user account is created, the system now automatically creates a consumer shopping page with a unique URL that is specific to the broker. These broker-specific shopping pages provide the following features:
Many of our agents have nearly doubled their sales with the integration of this online submission platform. Don’t wait, AEP is right around the corner and now is a great time to bring your business into the future. Request Details today and we will help you get started. |
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Tags: Online Enrollment, Medicare Advantage, Medicare Part D, Insurance Technology
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Offer Competitive Part D Prescription Plans from a company your clients will know and trust A leader in senior health solutions, Mutual of Omaha will offer Medicare Part D prescription drug plans to seniors across the country, the company announced. Medicare Part D plans will be available in 49 states beginning with the 2019 plan year.
Two Part D plans – the Mutual of Omaha Rx Value plan and the Mutual of Omaha Rx Plus plan – will be introduced in conjunction with the Medicare open enrollment period that begins on Oct. 15.
Request details today and make sure you have this competitive PDP product available this AEP. |
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Tags: Medicare, Part D, mutual of omaha
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Closing the Donut Hole:
Since that initial design decision, Congress made changes to reduce the impact of the donut hole. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) required drug manufacturers to give significant discounts while people were in the gap and began a phase-in of a federal subsidy for beneficiaries. The ACA gradually decreased the percentage that people with Part D are responsible for and planned to close the gap in 2020 for both brand-name and generic drugs. However, the gap for brand-name drugs will close one year sooner because of legislation—the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (BBA)—passed early this year. Starting in 2019, this legislation makes the transition into the coverage gap for brand-name drugs seamless for people with Part D by decreasing their financial burden and requiring more financial support by pharmaceutical manufacturers. The coverage gap for generic drugs will still close in 2020. Importantly, closing the coverage gap eases but does not eliminate problems of drug affordability for people with Medicare. The underlying high drug costs mean that more and more people are reaching the spending thresholds that trigger the donut hole. Once they spend enough in the donut hole, they reach yet another level called “catastrophic coverage.” In catastrophic coverage, people’s out-of-pocket responsibilities seem low at 5%, but they do not have a cap. This means that very expensive drugs are a huge burden to beneficiaries.
Read the Kaiser Family Foundation’s donut hole data note. |
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The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) released a data note on the Medicare Part D coverage gap, commonly referred to as the “donut hole.” When Congress expanded Medicare to cover prescription drugs by adding Part D, they built in a coverage gap that made drug coverage disappear when people reached a certain spending level, then reappear when they hit another threshold. This donut hole left many people with Medicare struggling to afford their medications for at least part of the year..png?width=275&name=Closing%20the%20donut%20hole%20(1).png)
The KFF data note breaks down the number of people with Part D who reach the various levels of coverage, what their average spending is, and how beneficiaries, drug manufacturers, drug plans, and the federal government split up the responsibility for various charges. Importantly, the note discusses the implications some future policy decisions may have on people with Medicare, including calls from manufacturers to decrease the amount they pay or proposals from the Trump Administration that would sharply increase the money people with Part D must spend. This change in particular would have significant, negative implications for people with Medicare. Medicare Rights seeks to keep the BBA reforms in place and opposes any policies that would reopen the donut hole or increase out-of-pocket expenses for beneficiaries.Tags: Medicare, Part D, donut hole
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Big Medicare Changes Coming to Minnesota
For more than a year, insurers have been sizing up the coming shift with Medicare Cost plans, a specific type of coverage that’s distinct from Medicare Advantage plans that are more common outside Minnesota. This summer, insurers that sell Medicare Cost plans are sending several hundred thousand letters to consumers about the transition. There’s no change to coverage in 2018, they point out, while stressing that details about 2019 options aren’t yet available. State Press Release: https://mn.gov/commerce/media/news/?id=17-343500 “Stay calm. Check your mail,” said Jim Schowalter, chief executive of the Minnesota Council of Health Plans, a trade group. “Set aside some time this fall to look at your options.” In the 1970s, the federal Medicare health insurance program for people age 65 and older started signing contracts with managed care plans on a cost-reimbursement basis, creating a private health plan option for some benefits. Health plans in Minnesota were among the carriers that opted to introduce Medicare Cost health plans, and they maintained the coverage even after the federal government in the 1980s launched a different program that’s now Medicare Advantage (MA). In MA plans, private insurers also manage care for enrollees. But as the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) explained in a 2009 report: “Unlike cost plans, MA plans assume financial risk if payments from [the federal government] do not cover their costs.” A federal law passed in 2003 created a “competition” requirement for Medicare Cost plans, which stipulated the plans could not be offered in service areas where there was significant competition from Medicare Advantage plans. Congress delayed implementation of the requirement several times until a law passed in 2015 that called for the rule to take effect in 2019. Minnesota is one of the few places where this is a big deal. |
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Tags: Medicare Advantage, Medicare
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Aetna & UPMC renew Western PA
We’re excited to announce Aetna’s renewed relationship with UPMC. Click here to read the full story.
Aetna employs about 6,500 people in Pennsylvania and is proud to have been serving its communities since 1890, providing choice and access to care with competitive health care plans and Medicare Advantage plans. FOR AGENT USE ONLY. Not intended for consumers. |
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Tags: Medicare Advantage, Medicare, aetna
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Attention Thrivent Agents:
Become one of the top 10 producers of Thrivent Medicare supplement insurance by January 2019 and embark with us on an all-expenses-paid home building trip (with one guest) to Sebring, Florida to participate in the Habitat Hammers Back recovery efforts with Habitat for Humanity. Then, put down the hammers and pick up your beach towel because this four-day Habitat build is followed by a relaxing weekend at a resort
Option of two qualifying prizes
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The Future of Medicare Supplement
8th Annual Market Projection The Medicare program continues to offer sustainable, long-term growth and opportunities. Over 75 million individuals are expected to be enrolled in the Medicare program by 2027. This means that roughly 17 million more individuals will be added to the Medicare program over the next 10 years, a 29% increase. Beyond 2027, an additional 11.5 million are projected to be added by 2040. CSG Actuarial research indicates Medicare Supplement enrollments will continue to grow at a rate exceeding Medicare enrollment growth over the next 10 years, creating ever-increasing opportunities for insurance carriers, agents and marketing organizations in the Medicare Supplement market.
The annual growth rate of Medicare Supplement beneficiaries slowed in 2017 following two years of the highest rates of increase in recent years. Much of that slowdown was claimed by Medicare Advantage products, with the annual growth rate of Medicare Advantage beneficiaries increasing to 7.7% for 2017. This is likely due to higher average Medicare Supplement rate increases for 2017, and to the moratorium on the “ACA Fee” for 2017. This fee is intended to help fund the provisions of the Affordable Care Act, and must be paid by Medicare Advantage carriers. Medicare Supplement business is exempt. Various estimates suggest that premiums are generally 2-3% higher due to this fee. Medicare Supplement market has displayed sustained growth over time, mostly attributable to three factors: 1. The number of Medicare beneficiaries has grown by about 28% since 2008. 2. Employers have continued to remove Medicare-aged retirees from their employer health plans, with some providing them with a stipend to purchase individual coverage. These actions have resulted in a steady decline in the percentage of Medicare beneficiaries without a Medicare Advantage or Medicare Supplement plan, including in 2017. The number of Medicare beneficiaries without one of these products has remained fairly flat for over a decade, even as the beneficiary count has climbed. 3. Relatively low increases in average Medicare Supplement premiums have been observed in recent years. This is likely driven by a shift to more Plan G and Plan N, by lower medical trend rates compared to historical averages, and by competitive pressures in the market as more new entrants attempt to gain market share. These factors and our expectation of the degree to which they would continue were included in the development of CSG Actuarial’s Medicare Supplement market projection.
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Highmark Medicare Plans will lose in-network
Seniors with the plans will lose in-network access at the end of June 2019, when a state-brokered consent decree between the two health care giants expires. A Commonwealth Court judge had interpreted the consent decree to mean UPMC would have to continue to accept the insurance through June 2020.
Doctor visits and hospital services typically cost much less when the doctors and hospitals are in an insurer’s network than when they aren’t. Seniors with Highmark Medicare Advantage plans who see UPMC doctors will have to either switch doctors or pay much higher prices to see their UPMC doctors as of next July. Or they can switch insurers during the open enrollment period for the plans, which will run from Oct. 15 to Dec. 7, to pick a plan that includes their UPMC doctors and hospitals. Some Highmark Medicare Advantage plans include access to UPMC hospitals and doctors and some don’t. About 50,000 seniors living in Allegheny and Erie counties have Security Blue and Freedom Blue plans, which include UPMC, Billger said. People with Community Blue plans, which don’t include UPMC, won’t see any changes, he said. About 17,000 seniors in Westmoreland County have Medicare Advantage plans that provide access to UPMC.
The change to networks coming in the middle of the plan year could create confusion for seniors who don’t know it’s coming, said Bill McKendree, coordinator for the Allegheny County APPRISE program, which helps seniors with enrollment. McKendree said the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services could decide to create a special window in which seniors losing access to UPMC doctors could switch plans after June 30. Or CMS might not do that, he said. “This is a big old question mark,” he said. UPMC Health Plan, Aetna, Cigna and United Healthcare have all sold Medicare Advantage plans in the region in previous years. Highmark owns Allegheny Health Network and includes its hospitals in its plan networks. Seniors may also elect to enroll in traditional Medicare, rather than the Medicare Advantage plans. The traditional program includes all hospitals and doctors in the country who accept Medicare. McKendree advises seniors considering traditional Medicare to think about getting a Medigap supplemental plan, which covers many of the co-pays, deductibles and other costs of traditional Medicare. McKendree said all hospitals and doctors who accept Medicare must accept Medigap. The state brokered the consent decree between Highmark and UPMC in 2014 to govern relations between them until 2019. The two nonprofits had been unable to resolve contract disputes on their own that arose after Highmark Inc. announced it was buying the former West Penn Allegheny Health System to form the basis of Allegheny Health Network. UPMC said it wouldn’t contract with an organization owning competing hospitals. |
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Thousands of seniors with Highmark’s Medicare Advantage plans will lose in-network access to UPMC hospitals a year earlier under a Wednesday state Supreme Court decision than they would have under a lower court’s ruling.
“We are disappointed in today’s Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling,” Highmark spokesman Aaron Billger said in an emailed statement. “While this is not how we interpreted the consent decrees intended to guide the Highmark and UPMC relationship, we will work in full compliance with the ruling and trust UPMC will do the same.”
“UPMC is grateful the Supreme Court expeditiously reached this decision, allowing seniors ample time to make the best choices for their health care,” UPMC spokesman Paul Wood said in an emailed statement.Tags: Medicare Advantage plans, Medicare
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Aetna releases New telephonic enrollment option for Medicare Advantage sales
To use RATE, you must have an iPad. You’ll also need to complete a short user training and quiz. Just contact us at 800-998-7715 to schedule a training session. How it works Step 1: First, you meet with your client and provide the required sales presentation and materials. (Please note that RATE does not replace your one-on-one client appointments.) If your client decides to enroll sometime after that meeting, you can schedule an appointment to complete the enrollment by phone. Step 2: At the scheduled date and time, your client will call you on your unique RATE-specific 1-800 phone number. You’ll receive that call on your iPad. Step 3: Next, you’ll walk them through an approved telephonic enrollment script that’s built into RATE to complete the enrollment. The calls are instantly and automatically recorded. What are the benefits?
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Tags: Medicare Advantage plans, Medicare, aetna
