2017 Obamacare Open Enrollment Starting Soon

 

Open Enrollment for Obamacare is upon us every year. The enrollment period for 2017 will be from the 1st of November 2016 to the 31st January 2017. During this limited period, anyone can enroll for health insurance.  If you miss this enrollment period, then you will only be able to enroll in the scheme if you qualify for one of the special enrollment periods. Obamacare Enrollment Tips

Special enrollment periods have strict requirements. You may qualify if you go through specific life events (e.g. get married or have a baby), or if you lose your existing health coverage.

Obamacare has strict requirements, but that doesn’t mean that the government wants people to go uninsured. If your are uninsured and miss open enrollment you might end up needing to take out a short term plan, but it’s a good idea to take advantage of the open enrollment period when it starts, because that will save you a lot of money in the long term.

During the open enrollment period you can enroll for a new plan, switch plans, or take advantage of subsidies that are offered on certain plans.  Compared to Medicaid and CHIP, or paying the exemption penalty, open enrollment is a very, very good deal.

So, make sure that you take advantage of the limited window to enroll in a major medical plan. Remember that this time period is the only time that you can get a plan that counts as minimum essential coverage without having to pay the exemption fee. If you already have employer coverage or something like Medicare or Medicaid, the you might not be too concerned about open enrollment, but Obamacare is a boon for those on lower incomes and those whose employers don’t have great benefit packages.

If you want to get subsidized insurance then you will need to enroll in the health insurance marketplace. If you want to avoid the monthly fee that is charged for not having insurance, then you will need to either take out insurance that counts as the minimum essential coverage, and be sure to hold it throughout the year, or you will need to obtain an exemption.  Any coverage that you take out via the marketplace during open enrollment will count as minimum essential coverage.

Note that not all Obamacare plans auto-renew.  This means that it’s important that you check your coverage when the next open enrollment time comes around, and verify your renewals. To avoid fees, you need to have coverage that started early enough to apply to the current year, and you need to have maintained that coverage throughout the year. There is a grace period of three consecutive months that you can have missing coverage for. This is intended to support people who lost coverage through changing employers, or other changes in circumstances. Don’t try to ‘get by’ without coverage, because it can be quite expensive to get emergency treatment while you are uninsured. Once you are on Obamacare, you should try to stay on it for as long as possible, given that it’s a great deal on medical insurance.