My name's Tim Tracy, co-founder of InsuringCT.com, and this is your health insurance coverage options. Your health insurance coverage options are one of the most important things to you and something that shouldn't be taken lightly. If you're employed through an employer, you're going to want to look and review to see, A. if they offer health insurance. And if they do, are there more than one options available? Are they covering just yourself, or are they covering your dependents? You'll also want to review, if you're not employed or you're self-employed, the individual health insurance options available to you. Either if you're going through a group plan or an individual plan, there's going to be a lot of similarities. You're going to hear topics or plan design names such as PPO, or Preferred Provider Organization. You're also going to hear about HMOs, or Health Maintenance Organizations, and POS, which stands for Point of Service Organization. It's important to understand the different options that are available to you in order for you to make the right decision. A PPO or Preferred Provider Organization, provides you with an in-network and out-of-network benefit. This allows you to see any doctor or facility of your choice. If you go in-network, you're going to get a richer benefit, and you're going to have lower out-of-pocket costs. But, if you want to use a doctor or facility that doesn't accept insurance, you have the ability to do so, and you're still going to receive coverage. The opposite of that is an HMO, or Health Maintenance Organization. An HMO limits you to utilizing just doctors or facilities within that network. Those typically can be the lower premium option plans for you. So, as long as your doctor and facilities that you want to use participate, that might be a viable option for you. POS, or Point of Service option is very similar to a PPO, with a little combination of an HMO. It has an in-network benefit with lower co-payments and deductibles, but it also allows you to utilize out-of-network benefits. However, those out-of-network benefits, typically, have much higher deductibles and no co-pays. Another option that you'll hear, commonly, is HSA, or Health Savings Account. These are high deductible health insurance plans, which means you're responsible for that deductible prior to the insurance kicking in. But it also allows you to set up a savings account that you can contribute pretax dollars to to pay for that deductible, as well as other qualifying medical expenses. My name is Tim Tracy, co-founder of InsuringCT.com, and this is your health insurance coverage options.
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