Forum Moderators: LifeinAsia
A lot of us are sole proprieters or small corporations. Options for health insurance are limited.
We joined what we thought was an 'independent business association' that partnered with a broker for health insurance coverage for members. We ran into a billing dispute some time later. (they dropped our son for non payment because of a billing error on their part). Now they want several thousand plus lawyers fees etc.
When I tried to work with the 'business association' I was stonewalled. They were completely unresponsive. I could not even get a copy of the bylaws to determine how to file a complaint. After some digging, I found that a good part of their board is actually composed of employees of the insurance broker. Every point of contact on the business association website, except for the president, is an employee of the insurance broker. No wonder they were unresponsive.
Their advertising makes it appear that they are two seperate organizations.
So far our state attorney general has done nothing that we know of. It actually comes down to me having to file a fraud report with our local police department. (in addition we are fighting our way through the court system. We are currently on defense but that should change soon).
So, if you are looking at health insurance through a business association.
1. Do a lot of searching to see if it is a legitimate business association (such as a chamber) or a marketing arm of an insurance broker
2. Hit the websites of both organizations and look for interlocking employees
3. Pull the corporate data from your state for both organizations. See if there are common names among the officers.
4. Look out when the 'business association' 'just happens to share' the same address as the insurance company.
5. If you subscribe to the wall street journal, look for a 15 page article by Chad Terhune that details how these fake associations work.
6. Ask to see the business associations bylaws before signing up for health insurance. If you can't see the bylaws - that is a huge red flag
7. Read the insurance agreements carefully - any draconian provisions favoring the insurance company (high legal fees for collections) are a tip off.
Don't expect your state to police things. My guess is that they don't want to touch these relationships because a lot of people get their insurance that way.
BTW - we are incorporated as an s-corp. we get our healthcare through our corp. The corp now gets health care through our local chamber after dumping the fraudsters. The chamber
- Has it's own employees
- has a board that is obviously not controlled by the insurance broker they use
- Will allow you to see the bylaws at any time (The president was actually surprised that any organization would make seeing the bylaws difficult).
There are other business associations besides chambers that are legitimate stand alone organizations. the trick is to figure out which is which.
Cg
Now with my diagnosis, I am stuck with the plan (but I got Anthem's best plan) and they cannot raise my rates fortunately because of my diagnosis. (They can raise the rates yearly.)
When I was running an answering service, one of the women that I worked with, her husband was doing something like this. My gut - told me something just was not right and I did not choose to go through them and within about eight months, they were no longer in business and I would not have had insurance.
Insurance companies are very particular in cases like this. Personal plans and company plans differ so much. Heck even before I signed up with Anthem, I called them a few times and asked them the same question (just to make sure I would get the same answer).
Now I am on a personal and company plan. I cannot dump the personal plan because if anything were to happen to the company (which I know it won't - but since I am listed as a spouse...)chances were be I would be paying a higher rate for personal insurance.
-Corey
