The holidays are over. 2020 is in the record books. Now… put yourself in the shoes of an employee.
You’re optimistic about what’s in store for 2021. You’re setting your objectives at work. You’ve completed your benefits open enrollment. Your medical ID card for your high deductible health plan just arrived. And with that, there’s the unknown, trepidation and maybe even some fear. Why? Well, it’s simple.…
Your deductible has reset to $0 and whether you have a $2,000, $3,000 or a $4,000 deductible or even higher for your family, you’re wondering if this is the year you or a family member will experience an unexpected, large medical expense, because if it is, you don’t know how you’re going to pay the bill.
Oh wait, you think. You have money in savings you could use. Or you could pull money out of your 401(k). You could even borrow money from mom and dad or your kids if you had to.
But I’m guessing none of these sound like preferable options.
Then you realize you signed up for a Health Savings Account. Great, you can use that money to pay the bill. Then you remember… you haven’t been contributing much over the past few years. In fact you have less than $1,000 in the account. So even if you used all of that money, you’d not get close to paying off the deductible. You’d still be out of pocket thousands of dollars.
You dig a little deeper into your HSA and find that there is in fact a provision that will advance you money. You’re feeling pretty good – as you keep reading you realize you can only be advanced up to the total amount you’re contributing over the year. You have only put aside a nominal amount to contribute to your HSA so you don’t really have much you can withdraw. It seems that the other options, like calling mom and dad, might still be necessary.
So put yourself in the shoes of an employee. What would you do?
Lane Health can help. Check out www.lanehealth.com for information on our unique Advance feature.
Story to be continued…….
