So you have left your company hopefully voluntarily but these, days there\’s a lot of involuntary moves. Either way, you\’ll probably have a Cobra offer if the company had a California group health insurance plan. What is Cobra and how does it compare with possible individual family insurance on the California market? Great question and potentially one where the answer can save you quite a bit of money. Let\’s walk through what to consider when comparing your Cobra option to available options on the Individual Family California health insurance market.

First, what is Cobra. Cobra is essentially continuation of your group health plan where you pay the premiums. The premiums are generally the same total cost the company was paying (both your contribution and theirs) plus an administration fee generally of 10% higher than the group rate. You should receive a Cobra packet directly from the carrier or from your company by mail so make sure they have your correct address. You have a 62 day window to elect Cobra retroactively back to your last date of group coverage and the letter you receive should stipulate important dates pertaining to this window. You can generally piecemeal Cobra which means that you can elect Cobra for just certain family members…even just for dependent spouses or children. This becomes important later in our discussion. You may also have options to change coverage at the time of electing Cobra assuming that the company had multiple plan options or a cafeteria type plan. Cobra is not medically underwritten and you can continue on your group health plans for 18 months and sometimes 36 (if there\’s a Cal-Cobra extension or if certain requirements occur such as divorce, death of spouse, etc). So that\’s the good news. Why even look at the California individual health market?

Cobra is generally expensive because group health insurance is generally expensive. This is due to the fact that under State law, California group health insurance is guaranteed issue as long as the company meets certain requirements. Eligible employees cannot be declined due to health. Of course, there\’s always a cost and group health (and by extension, Cobra) will be more expensive, apples to apples for comparable coverage. How much more expensive? Quite a bit and in some cases double. That\’s really the reason to look at California individual health insurance.

Individual family health coverage can be much less expensive than Cobra but there\’s a catch. Currently (aside from children), we need to qualify based on health. If we have more recent or serious health issues, the carriers can decline coverage. Feel free to run through your current health status/history and we\’ll try to provide some guidance on how the carriers might look at it. So what\’s our recommendation?

First run a California individual health quote from our site, www.calhealth.net or have us run one for you. We just need your ages and zip code. If the rates are significantly less expensive than your Cobra info, let\’s apply. There\’s no downside aside from the roughly 20 minutes it takes to apply online. There\’s no application fee and the rates on our site are the best available. We\’ll see what they come back with. If we like the offer, we take it and avoid Cobra\’s higher bill. If we don\’t, you have a 10 day free look window to cancel the policy never effective. Remember when we mentioned the piecemeal option? Generally in a family, one person might have health issues but the other family members are healthy. Find out what the Cobra rate is for each person and apply together. Make sure not to select the \”all or none\” option on the app so that the carrier will underwrite each member even if someone is declined. This way, we can save the more expensive Cobra for declined members but have cheaper individual coverage for health family members. Make sure to start the process in advance of your 62 days running out. Under new rules, we can pick an individual/family effective date no sooner than 15 days following the online app submittal. We never want to lose our Cobra option until we have a hard approval back from the carrier for the plan and rate we want. Of course, we\’re happy to help you navigate this decision and process with no additional cost to you.

Dennis Jarvis is a licensed California health insurance quote broker with extensive knowledge of the Individual and Small Group health market in California. free California health insurance quote

Dennis Jarvis is a licensed California health insurance broker with extensive knowledge of the Individual and Small Group health market in California. More information can be found at http://www.calhealth.net

Author Bio: Dennis Jarvis is a licensed California health insurance quote broker with extensive knowledge of the Individual and Small Group health market in California. free California health insurance quote

Category: Finances
Keywords: california health insurance, california health quote,individual california health insurance quote