Cape Seniors: Beware of Medicare Advisory Services That Want to Charge You $300-$400

Cape Seniors: Beware of services that charge $300-$400 for "Medicare Advice." They are popping up everywhere but it is unlikely that you would see a return on that investment. What's really bad is that these $300-$400 Medicare advice services are probably really trying to sell you something else besides Medicare advice. 

There's no silver bullet. Depending on your drug list and your tolerance for risk you are going to spend between $1200 and $3600 on Medicare and supplemental insurance each year in Massachusetts (double that for a couple of course) plus some additional amount of money out of pocket. The drug list and your choice of doctors controls that spread almost entirely. No Medicare advice firm can change your drug list or your doctor preferences.

So here's $10,000 worth of advice for free. There are only three basic ways you can save money relative to Medicare living in Massachusetts (and we have it better than seniors living in most states):

1. If you make under a certain amount, you can get your Medicare Part B and C or D for free or highly discounted through the state of Massachusetts (Vets' Services or MassHealth) and/or Social Security. Contact these organizations if you want to know if you qualify. Almost 50% of seniors who buy their own Medicare supplemental insurance (as opposed to getting it from a former employer) qualify for some kind of assistance.
2. Even if you make up to $70,000 in retirement you can get Massachusetts' Prescription Advantage. People who make from between about $50,000 to $70,000 have to buy into the program but it provides great donut hole protection if you need it (about 10% of you do). If you make under about $50,000 (but you are not in group 1 above), Prescription Advantage costs nothing and provides even better donut hole protection.  
3. You need to run your drug list through the Medicare Plan Finder after you have decided whether you want private Medigap insurance or a public Part C Medicare Advantage plan as your supplement. This will help you find out how you can save money using preferred pharmacies, zero-premium Part C plans if they make sense, and other features of Part C or D with Medigap plans (more to come on future posts but I already covered one example of how to save money in the Medigap Core vs. Supplement-1 post here).