Winning in Retirement

Medicare and Retiree Health Care

• Akers Financial Group

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Unknown:

The following is a pre recorded show, welcome to winning in retirement with your host, Brian AKERS, Certified Financial Planner, professional and founder of AKERS Financial Group now helping you win in your retirement. Here's Brian AKERS,

BRIAN AKERS:

welcome to winning in retirement. I'm Brian AKERS from AKERS Financial Group, President, founder, Certified Financial Planner, practitioner, and proud to be announcing Jeff AKERS as our co host today on winning in retirement, the AKERS financial radio podcast we put on. We welcome you to our show today, we welcome Jeff. 25 years of service with working together. So we look forward to an incredible show. Lots of pressure on you here, Jeff, there's

Jeff Akers:

so much I could say, but I won't. I won't. It's just good to be here. Brian, you're not gonna say anything. I'm not gonna say anything

BRIAN AKERS:

bad. This is a show. This show is gonna be where we demonstrate the special. How do you say the specialness, the special things that Jeff brings to AKERS Financial Group, the uniqueness, uniqueness inside of an ensemble practice. If you're a technical financial advising ensemble, that's a big word. That means a collection of planners come together, and certain ones have expertise, and today is your expertise.

Jeff Akers:

Yippee, I get to talk about stuff,

BRIAN AKERS:

right? Well, then we designed the show with with Jeff and mine and with you in mind, because it's Medicare season. So we came up with a show called Medicare and retirement health care. That sounds pretty good to me. Well, the reason we want to do a show like this is, when we think about retirement, what is going to be one of the biggest costs in your retirement years? It's going to be health care. Health

Jeff Akers:

care between the premium that you pay, the co pays that you make. It's just a huge number. We tell people be sure to pay off your mortgage before you retire, because your new mortgage payment is going to be your health care.

BRIAN AKERS:

All right? So everybody's different on the health care. Some of you work at certain jobs where you get provided health care now, and also when you retire. Some people have health care now, but not when they retire, right? Someone retire at 65 or over. Somebody will retire before 65 there's the whole Medicare season. What does that mean? So I just got 1000 questions for you, Jeff. So I just want everybody to hold on tight. There's a lot of options out there. With a lot going on, we want to cover it all today, right? Ooh, not everything. I don't know everything, but that's why we're here. But it is the Medicare season. I almost put that to a Christmas song, Medicare season. Now I should not sing on radio. So today, Jeff AKERS gonna talk about Medicare. Later in the show, we're gonna talk about retirement, healthcare and how it all works together. It's part of the retirement budget. Oh yes, not that we have to be on a budget retirement. We need to know what the nut is, what the number is,

Jeff Akers:

right, right? Budget, spending plan, something this is going to take some of your income.

BRIAN AKERS:

Well, think of a positive word for budget. Is there a such thing as a P word for budget? A P word for budget? Every P words a positive word, please? Proper purpose. I'd powerful.

Jeff Akers:

I kind of like the idea of spending plan. I know it starts with an the second word has planned. So it's a plan

BRIAN AKERS:

that's for plan, all right. So Medicare, what is your Medicare plan as you enter retirement? And then Medicare season makes us and reminds us that we got to look at this every

Jeff Akers:

fall, every year. We need to take a look to see where we are,

BRIAN AKERS:

all right. So Medicare season, what is actually that?

Jeff Akers:

Jeff, so there's a period of time from October 15 to December 7, where, depending on the kind of Medicare that you have, it's there's open enrollment for Medicare Advantage stuff, but also primarily for prescriptions, because every year at this time, you can choose a different prescription plan that's your Part D, and so you can choose The plan that's going to be best for next year. Whatever you had this year might not be the best next year, and you can change that all right?

BRIAN AKERS:

So Part D, let's go over a real simple thing. Medicare is an alphabet. Oh, Medicare, it's an alphabet, right? So Part D, D for drugs. Is that a way I should do it? And that's for your prescriptions. Is it fully covered by Part D your prescriptions? Or is your supplement tie in there too well?

Jeff Akers:

Supplements only cover what you get at your doctor's office, if you had some prescription thing that's injected to you in the doctor's office that's covered under Part B, as in,

BRIAN AKERS:

boy B. What's another way of remembering B?

Jeff Akers:

I just remember Part B is outpatient, but sure, be an outpatient. What's part A? Part A is hospitalization,

BRIAN AKERS:

and that's something you have to sign up at 65

Jeff Akers:

Well, part A is, quote, unquote, free, free, so there's no premium for it in retirement. So you don't have a choice. If you sign up for Social Security, you automatically get part a. You don't have the choice of saying, I don't want

BRIAN AKERS:

it. All right, so a B, all right, tell me there is there a C out there,

Jeff Akers:

there is a C. What is that? That's that's what we call Medicare Advantage. Okay, so traditional Medicare is a B and D, and your Medicare Advantage is a second option. Sure you can. Used instead of, well, instead of having a supplement, you'd have Medicare Advantage, which you still have a B, but the Medicare Advantage is your your supplement that fills

BRIAN AKERS:

from the gap. And this is incredible information. And I, I know everybody's driving, riding, riding around the lawn mower or blowing leaves or doing something right now, their eyes are rolling back in their head, but the alphabet soup of Medicare is something that you need to understand, and there's a time of life when you need to understand this. In our in our business, we enjoy our local county, Harford County has a Department of Aging.

Jeff Akers:

It's a fantastic organization. Explain what they do, how they help. So when it comes to Medicare, they help with education. Sure can talk about some of the things we're talking about, speaking at AKERS events. They come and speak at our events. They they provide us with information because things are changing all the time, correct with Medicare and the laws and everything. So they help keep us up to date on what's going on. And of course, you know, they'll, they'll talk to individuals that that come in as well at

BRIAN AKERS:

their office, at their offices, right? And so Department of Aging is something that in Maryland, we're very blessed with. You ought to check out your local Department of Aging that help you understand your Medicare choices right now, I'd like to get back right into to the Open Season, okay? And you're saying that applies to your drug plan, because you make a change now you can make a change for the better and for and lowering up and down. What can you do each

Jeff Akers:

year? Well, for part D, it's kind of nice because there's actually a tool on the Medicare website where you put in your prescriptions the pharmacy you go to. It shows you all the plans and tells you which one will be the least expensive overall next

BRIAN AKERS:

year, counting your co pay with it and however it works, right?

Jeff Akers:

Deductibles, co pays, premium, everything gets added in and your total cost for that plan. But

BRIAN AKERS:

that's on a Medicare website, right? What is the Medicare website? Medicare.gov dot, G O V G O V G, as in George, Oscar, Victory. Victory, sure, yeah, I wasn't military, so I don't know the code. I wish. I wish I had the NATO alphabet, but medicare.gov is a really good way to go on and do this information, shopping your drugs based on what's changing in your life, what kind of prescription you're on now, husband and wife different plans, or they have to have the same plan.

Jeff Akers:

I know when we're working and we're so used to, oh, I've got a family plan through work, and my wife is covered. My kids are covered. Well, you get to Medicare, it's all individual. Oh, good. So very good. The husband can have one plan. The wife has a totally different plan. They're just completely separate when you get to Medicare, all

BRIAN AKERS:

right? So, so open season is for drugs. That means it's not for Part B for your medical, right?

Jeff Akers:

Yeah, well, the Part A, B, yeah, those are just the government plans. There's nothing you can do with those. You're those are just what you have. Okay, then you can get a supplement and to make things really simple, I love this. You've got Part A, B, C and D. We've just talked about those as easy as 123, it's as easy as 1234, then you get to your Medicare supplements, and they call these plans Sure. And to keep it simple, it's Plan A, B, C, D, all the way to like, n, n, okay, right. So it's either a part which is the A, B, C, D, or it's a plan which is the Medicare Supplement. And sometimes folks get confused or like, and they'll know why I've got part G's,

BRIAN AKERS:

yeah, all right. So in the plans, as you're retiring and you're entering into Medicare the first time. What kind of general advice would you have

Jeff Akers:

so where you're coming from? So I'm going to pretend that you've been retired, you don't have employer health plan or anything, and you're turning 65 there's a window of time three months before you turn 65 the month you turn 65 and three months after so there's a total of seven months where you can sign up for Medicare Part A and B without a penalty. If you miss that window, there's going to be a penalty on Part B, because there's a premium for that that you're going to pay the rest of your life. And on Part D, the prescription plan, there will be a penalty for that for the rest of your life. So you want to make sure that you sign up when you need to. But that window, we usually recommend three months before your birthday. Let's go ahead and sign up. Get the ball rolling, because you have to have that Medicare card, so you have to have signed up for a and b before you can get a supplement sure or a prescription plan, so we want to make sure you've got plenty of time and you don't lose any coverage that you you should have,

BRIAN AKERS:

all right. So now we have Medicare plans that are supplements. Those supplements have alphabets, but every open season you you. You're not changing it. But then there's something called a birthday rule, and then there's a rule about how you can change your supplement plan. Just a simple

Jeff Akers:

rule, Medicare, supplements are guaranteed issue during that window when you first sign up for Medicare, but after that, if you wanted to change plans, you'd be medically underwritten. So they could say, we're not going to cover that part, or we're not going to offer you insurance at all. A couple of years ago, Marilyn passed the the birthday rule, which means 30 days after your birthday every year, you have the option to change your supplement plan. It can be an equal level plan or a lesser value plan. You can't have a bad plan and then change to a better plan, but you could have a better plan and change to an equal or lesser plan.

BRIAN AKERS:

So in the Medicare plan, alphabet is in in like Nancy, is that the best plan? And then if you go down or back down the alphabet, or is there's not a simple way

Jeff Akers:

like that. Actually go with G, Jesus playing. Okay, I like G being best. G is good or great. G is for good and is probably second best. When I say best covers the most, sure, yeah, so.

BRIAN AKERS:

But if I go in cheap, I pick a low level, right? I can never upgrade, right? You can't upgrade without being medically underwritten. Okay, that's the key. Medically underwritten means you have to say all your aches and pains, everything the doctor has seen you for, and then they could come and exclude things, right? Okay?

Jeff Akers:

And usually, you know, you start out you're you're healthier when you sign up for Medicare than you are 10 years down the road. Yeah, it's sort

BRIAN AKERS:

of like you're preparing for the worse when you're healthy, just like normal savings, saving for the future. You Right, right. Wow. There's a lot going on in Medicare. It is Medicare season. We've blown through the first quarter. Jeff, thank you very much. So as we close out this first quarter, we know that the best part of retirement is getting your time back, where you decide how to use it. Before retirement, your time is tied up with other commitments. Oh, you know, mainly your job, a lot of that goes away in retirement, your time is now consumed by things that you want to do. It's so easy to begin winning in retirement. Go to our website at AKERS financial group.com scroll to the schedule meeting section and let us know you'd like to schedule a free consultation with one of our team of advisors. That's AKERS financial group.com or you can call us at 833, win retire. That's 830 3w, I n, r, e, t, I R, E, we'll give you a call on Monday to schedule a free in person meeting. Go to AKERS financial group.com or call us at 833-946-7384, to start planning for your retirement now, depending upon where you live, Medicare Advantage may or may not be an advantage to you. We will explain in a moment.

Unknown:

You're listening to a pre recorded show, welcome back to winning in retirement. Call 833, win retire now to schedule a visit with Brian and his team and begin winning in retirement once again. Here's Brian AKERS. Welcome

BRIAN AKERS:

back to winning in retirement. I'm Brian AKERS from AKERS Financial Group. Here with me today is Jeff AKERS. Jeff AKERS and Brian AKERS are both certified financial planner practitioners, and we've been so for a long time.

Jeff Akers:

We have been so for a long time. And as you were saying it, it's like, oh yeah, both AKERS, that's because we're cousins.

BRIAN AKERS:

So cousins, that means our fathers are brothers, our grandmother is the same person.

Jeff Akers:

And while I've worked with you for 25 years, I've known you my entire life,

BRIAN AKERS:

I don't believe I was at the hospital, so I think I missed a couple days there, yeah, just a couple. Though it wasn't much. I have no video evidence of us, of me holding you as a two year old. All right, this is radio you're recording. Yes, let's go back to serious. So this show is called Medicare and retirement healthcare. What we wanted to do as a show during the Medicare season to help everyone understand the importance of making this a serious decision as part of your retirement plan, a serious decision each year, if you're going to make a change, why don't get sold things don't get manipulated by all the mail you get when you're turning 6465 make sure you're doing what's best for you. Because each of these Medicare decisions, Medicare Supplement, health care, retirement, is your individual decision, one for the spouse, one for yourself, and you get what is, what fits your need. It's all very important, so that's why we're doing this show. All right, Jeff, I know we're going to start off here in the second quarter about Medicare Advantage, okay? And Medicare Advantage, we do want to talk about the government provides part of Medicare, and then they have their plan of Medicare,

Jeff Akers:

right? That's part A, B, A, B, C, D, C, well, not really D, but a B, also D is actually private companies, right? You're buying that from a private company already, but it's regulated. Regulated. That's a good word by the government.

BRIAN AKERS:

Now Medicare Supplements are also private companies.

Jeff Akers:

That's through private companies. And the plans that we talked about before they're standardized. So if you buy a plan, G, we talked about that BG, for good. It doesn't matter what company you buy it from. It covers the same thing. So it's just a matter of, do you like that company and is the premium right

BRIAN AKERS:

during the show? I want to, I want to just drill you with questions. Oh boy, I'm not gonna do it right now. I'm just teasing you that it's coming, Jeff, you're gonna space them out. I I'm not near 65 yet. So anybody to think that? But I'm feeling it that it's coming down the road here. The hard part would be, is a lot of questions, but I'm we're gonna stick to the script right now. Okay, then I'm gonna go off road. All right. So Medicare Advantage, explain what that is, and explain the good things about it and what might not be the best. Yeah,

Jeff Akers:

so Medicare Advantage is Part C. C is in cat or Charlie. I think that's the word Charlie they use anyway. With Medicare Advantage, you still have Part A and B, so you still have to pay that premium for Part B, but then you're buying a plan from a private company. And these plans are network plans. They're usually HMOs, PPOs, that kind of thing. And so there's a network of doctors that you can go to, and you can't go outside of that network without paying more. The plan itself is usually less expensive, but you tend to have higher co pays, co insurance, that kind of thing on these plans, and they're very because of the network part of it. They're very regional specific. So you know, living in Harford County, you might have different plans than you would have in Baltimore County or Cecil County or anywhere else around Maryland. And

BRIAN AKERS:

so is it based on hospital groups or hospital setups, or who's offering it?

Jeff Akers:

Sometimes, sometimes it's based on that. And sometimes there's an insurance company, like a united healthcare or something, or an Aetna that will offer a Medicare Advantage plan in a certain area? Sure, here in Maryland, Johns Hopkins has usually offered a Medicare Advantage plan, but in that instance, it's something that's just not available in Harford County.

BRIAN AKERS:

So for residents, if your resident Harford County, you can't get it's the zip code where you live, really. Okay, all right, first off the wall question. Okay, all right, retirement. I'm retiring and I want to travel. Should I have a Medicare Advantage if I want to travel?

Jeff Akers:

So I'm going to go to the straight answer, which is probably not. And the reason is, Medicare Advantage. You've got that network, so you've got to go to a doctor in the network. What's an out of network coverage like, Well, if you've got an HMO Medicare Advantage, it's emergency only. If you have a PPO, there'll be some level of coverage. But you know that Preferred Provider Organization or whatever, that's still a network. It's just a bigger network, and so you still got to watch who

BRIAN AKERS:

you go to, and that's why you should always buy travel healthcare.

Jeff Akers:

Always get travel health care on traditional Medicare, where you've just got a B and supplements with that, you can go to any doctor that takes Medicare anywhere. So, you know, we've got snow birds a lot of times here in Maryland, they're in Maryland, and they're in Florida. And so you can go to a doctor there. You can go to a doctor here, if you have Medicare Advantage, then you can only go to the doctor here, and while you're in Florida, you've got sort of emergency coverage. Is it?

BRIAN AKERS:

All right, thanks for answering my tough question. Number one, I have a few more, but not right now. All right, so Medicare Advantage is a way of having a low premium.

Jeff Akers:

Yes, that's true. You can have a lower premium, but you are going to tend to have higher out of pocket expenses. Like, how low is low? It could be zero. No way these. You're saying zero with around circle zero. You see these commercials on TV. You could have, I think it's the TV on the TV on TV on television, yeah, you see these commercials this time of year about you could have free Medicare and, well, that's Medicare Advantage, and that's usually going to be a plan that is that has higher co pays, sure. I mean, it's an insurance company, so they're, they've got to make money somehow, right? So if you're not paying a premium, then you need to think about, how are they making money?

BRIAN AKERS:

How do they make money?

Jeff Akers:

Yeah, well, they're making these I think that was a trick question. They do get paid from the federal government, but they're making these contracts with providers. Basically, they're saying, Okay, we're gonna send you people. And, you know,

BRIAN AKERS:

did not sound nice. Basically, you get in line under their service, right? And then they're they're basically selling you're selling you, yeah, for a package, and they make the profit on the top right spread, right?

Jeff Akers:

And. You're not paying the insurance company, but you are paying the provider.

BRIAN AKERS:

Simplistic way of answering it, if somebody is listening going, that's not the right way. Yeah, there's a lot more to that, but generally, they're making money somehow, all right. So, so Medicare Advantage is lower. Now medica Medicare Advantage is the whole plan. Or do you supplement it?

Jeff Akers:

You're not buying a separate supplement. Medicare Advantage actually include, usually includes the prescriptions that covers part D. Traditional Medicare doesn't cover things like dental or vision. Sometimes, with an advantage plan, you can get dental and vision as part of that plan, right? Yeah, but

BRIAN AKERS:

that's through private companies Medicare Advantage.

Jeff Akers:

Medicare Advantage is through private companies. One of the issues that that can come up because of this network part to it, an insurance company will move into an area offer a fantastic plan, and people sign up for it, of course, and then after a year or two, the company is like, I'm not making any money on this, and so they pull out of that area. Yeah, and those people that were on that plan are now left having to find something else, right, and jump to something else. So that's, that's a drawback, I think, to Medicare Advantage,

BRIAN AKERS:

all right. Another question about Part D, so Part D prescription drugs, does that still have the donut hole and all those concepts? Or how does it work nowadays,

Jeff Akers:

nowadays there's an out of pocket maximum. And I think this started out of pocket. So is that, oh, PM, OPM, OPM, yeah, if you see oopm, that's out of pocket maximum. That's the most you'll pay in a calendar year, right? So for next year, that out of pocket maximum is $2,100

BRIAN AKERS:

next year being 2026

Jeff Akers:

26 $2,100

BRIAN AKERS:

is the most one person would pay, right?

Jeff Akers:

So if you have really expensive prescriptions, you're going to spend $2,100 through co pays and everything to get to that. You're not going to spend it all at once, hopefully. But once you hit that number, then your prescriptions are covered at 100% sure, so you don't pay anything after

BRIAN AKERS:

that. All right, is there a new rule called a smoothing rule with Part D?

Jeff Akers:

That there is a smoothing rule I mentioned the$2,100 let's say you do have a really expensive medicine that you have a high copay for and you're going to spend $2,100 in January, February or January. Well, sometimes it's hard to come up with $2,100 right away to use to cover it. So they will allow you to pay that $2,100 evenly over the 12 months. It's a little bit like budget billing that you get with BGE, you're still paying the same amount. You're just paying it over time, instead of all at once.

BRIAN AKERS:

All right, so that makes sense for especially if you have a hot, very expensive medicine or prescription that you're taking, it'll help you balance that payment

Jeff Akers:

out, right? For the most part, if you're taking generics, and kind of the, I'll call them, the normal medicines that people take, then you're not going to hit the $2,100 right?

BRIAN AKERS:

All right. The next, next thing is small business owners, some that different size of business affects Medicare options if you're an employer. Yeah.

Jeff Akers:

So this gets a little more complicated, but I'll do the best I can. Let's say you turn 65 you're still working. You still have health insurance through your employer. Do you have to sign up for Medicare? And the answer to that question is determined by how large is the company you're working for. There has to be at least 20 employees, and if there's more than 20, then you don't have to sign up for Medicare, because your employer plan is primary, and it will cover you once you retire, once you leave, right and you that coverage ends, you have to sign up for Medicare at that point. And earlier I mentioned the seven month window. It's the same kind of thing. You can sign up up to three months before the month of or three months after you

BRIAN AKERS:

lose coverage, after having a being covered by your employer, right? Your larger the company they have, the company each has their own ability to decide that. The company has the ability to decide, let's say it's a large company. What does a company have ability to decide, we're recovering Medicare or not?

Jeff Akers:

No, it's just they offer a plan to employees, and those employees are covered, and

BRIAN AKERS:

they that's what they have to provide, the larger they get. Yeah, all right, so we've been covering a lot of things here in this quarter, as quarters I'm flown by again, Medicare Advantage was a topic, and cleaning up little part D and throwing a little small business. All right, fast. AKERS Financial Group, we're local, we're independent. We don't report to a big company on Wall Street. We report to you. We do have offices in Lutherville Forest Hill, and we meet with clients all around the mid Atlantic region, all around the country, and even a few around the world. It's so easy to begin winning in retirement, all you got to do is give us a call to schedule your free in person. Meeting with one of our team of advisors by calling 833 when retire, that's 830 3w, I n, r, e, t, I R, E, and we'll give you a call on Monday to schedule your free in person meeting. Go to AKERS financial group.com or call us at 833-946-7384 to start planning for your retirement now, when you retire, what health care decisions do you need to make? Let's talk about this. When we return,

Unknown:

you're listening to a pre recorded Show. Welcome back to winning in retirement. Call 833, win retire now to schedule a visit with Brian and his team and begin winning in retirement once again. Here's Brian AKERS,

BRIAN AKERS:

welcome back to winning in retirement. I'm Brian AKERS, president and founder of AKERS Financial Group, and we welcome you back to the second half of winning in retirement with our co host Jeff AKERS, good morning again. Jeffrey, good morning again. Brian, very happy to have you here on the show and to show off your your talent.

Jeff Akers:

Yeah, with all these questions you got, I'm skills are happy your

BRIAN AKERS:

skill set, it's been good. It's been good trying to what I want on a show like this. Our show is called Medicare and retirement health care is it's a very important decision. And an AKERS finance group, it's part of the decision. It's part of the plan help you retire. This is one part. It's one of the things you got to work through. Where you get your health care from, how's it gonna be provided? What's it gonna cost you? What's your choices? Let's make the wise decision,

Jeff Akers:

and it's an important decision that on certain things, the choice you make at the beginning lasts with you for the rest of your life. So

BRIAN AKERS:

and we make a good one. Been the advisors out there going to manage your money right? And then they're they're called Full holistic service. Many people will do certain things. They might sell one investment or one one thing the hardest part, they might do a little analysis on taxes. You know, all these little pieces of the retirement plan, but the whole retirement plan includes so much, right? This is one segment that has to get answered and has to be answered in the right timing, and you have to answer it multiple times depending on when you actually retire,

Jeff Akers:

right? And out of that overall plan, this is kind of a small little niche part of it, but it can make a big difference, because it's going to be a Well, we talked about it earlier, it's going to be a large cost throughout your retirement, exactly

BRIAN AKERS:

right? So what we're going to talk about right now. It's about health care during retirement. As you get ready to start retirement, let's first talk about your age. Let's say someone is going up. I'm retiring. I'm 62, years old. I need I have no health care. I work with private companies. I'm out of here. What are the choices when they retire?

Jeff Akers:

All right, so let's pretend that you worked for a company that has a pension, then that pension might include healthcare benefits if it does, fantastic.

BRIAN AKERS:

Now, no, that's too easy of an answer. I want the hard answer. Well, that's

Jeff Akers:

the easy one. The next one is, you retire and you're eligible for COBRA. Cobra is where you can continue the coverage that you had, but now you're paying 100% of it, and at that point, most people realize how much their company was paying for their health

BRIAN AKERS:

insurance, which convert to people, could be 2000

Jeff Akers:

bucks, yes, per month, per month. So yes. And so the next option is you buy private insurance. You can go to in Maryland. You can go to the Maryland Health Connection, depending on your income level, you might get a subsidy for that plan. If you don't get a subsidy, you can still buy the same insurance from insurance carriers in the state, and you're just paying it out of pocket at that point, until you reach 65

BRIAN AKERS:

All right, so pre 65 these plans we're talking about are guaranteed issue. So if I'm leaving my company plan, I got to get a new plan. Am I guaranteed coverage? So

Jeff Akers:

this, there is actually an open enrollment for this now, it doesn't actually start until November, but the open enrollment for these plans through the Maryland Health Connection, they take effect January 1. They go for one year, and every year you can change your plan up until you get to Medicare. We've talked a lot about supplements that doesn't really have an open enrollment, but pre 65 these, these individual plans, there is an actual open enrollment, guaranteed issue, no medical

BRIAN AKERS:

underwriting. If I retired July 1, how do I get coverage?

Jeff Akers:

You can get coverage because you have a special circumstance. You don't

BRIAN AKERS:

have to wait for open enrollment based on retirement date. You just need to get

Jeff Akers:

proof that you had health insurance, and then you can sign up for the new health

BRIAN AKERS:

insurance. If I retire on the 30th of the month. When do I need coverage?

Jeff Akers:

Most plans end the last day of the month in which you retire. So don't retire on the 30th. Retire on the first or second.

BRIAN AKERS:

The first or second they have coverage for that month, and then the next month, the

Jeff Akers:

next month they need coverage. Usually, that's the case. There are some plans that say that the day you're out, you're off the plan, sure, but that's I haven't seen that

BRIAN AKERS:

all these things. We have to ask your company, wherever you work, what are they providing, right? What's gonna be the cost, all part of the financial plan and getting ready

Jeff Akers:

to retire? Yeah, what are they providing, and for how long? All right,

BRIAN AKERS:

so let's say, let's, let's, let's say what somebody's ready to retire. They're coming in to meet with you. They're gonna talk about healthcare. What kind of information do we need to know? Let's say they're 63 what kind of information do we need to know in the planning

Jeff Akers:

so well, we need to know, first off, what that company offers? Sure, what would, what would Cobra cost? Is there some sort of benefit through a pension or anything, assuming that there's no benefit through a pension, then we're comparing the cost of Cobra to what's the cost of regular insurance. And frankly, I mean, Cobra is very expensive, typically, compared to the individual plan. But if you've got a lot of health conditions, Cobra might cover more than what you're going to get on the the individual market for the same cost. So sometimes Cobra is the best choice. Sometimes it's not, and so at that point, we're going to go to the Maryland Health Connection. And when we do that, we need to know what's your income, where we project your income to be next year, because again, if it's low enough, then you might get a subsidy, and the cost of the plan could be very

BRIAN AKERS:

low. How about now the person's turning 65 and they're going to retire at 65 sort of a clean retirement. 65 lose their they work for private industry that they're going to lose their health care. What do they do at 65

Jeff Akers:

Yeah, once you turn 65 Cobra is not an option. You can't have Cobra after you turn 65 right? So if you're retiring the month that you turn 65 then go ahead and sign up for Medicare three months in advance, and that way, you've got it in place and ready to go. And the month you turn 65 boom, you have Medicare and your supplement, and you're off to the races, off to retirement. So if you're getting a supplement, how early do you apply for supplement? As soon as you get your Medicare number. So, so Medicare number is a card. It is a card, a physical card. Yeah, the it's a paper card. So people that have been retired for a while, it gets kind of all crumpled up. It used to be that your Medicare number was your social security number, and then they figured out that it's a really bad idea to make people carry around their social security number in their wallet all the time. Yeah, so now they've made up new numbers for your Medicare number, and you use that to apply for your supplement, for your prescription plan and so forth. After that, okay, and so that's all done that year, right? All done within three months.

BRIAN AKERS:

All right, so let's do the I call them the simpler answers. You work for a federal or state government, and they provide pensions and health care for retirees,

Jeff Akers:

right? And so what you can do is use Medicare Part A and B, but then that employer or the pension related plan is your supplement and it is your prescription plan. You have to prove that you for your prescriptions. You have to prove that you have creditable coverage, sure. And so if you have one of those plans through a pension, they send you a letter every year that says, This is creditable coverage, and we've notified the Centers for Medicare services. CMS,

BRIAN AKERS:

okay, so federal government, do they need Medicare, or what kind of rules they have with the federal government health care?

Jeff Akers:

So legally, you're supposed to sign up for Part A and Part B, if you don't, and down the road you choose to, there's going to be a penalty for Part B. There are a lot of federal employees who say my health coverage through my pension is fantastic. Why do I want to pay the premium for Part B? I don't need it, and so they don't sign up for it. They're they're taking a risk that one day they're going to have to sign up for Part B, and there'll be a penalty when you do that.

BRIAN AKERS:

Okay? So there are some choices, but not a lot the hard things in private industries. Private industries have been getting away from pensions, been paying them out lump sums, all that. And typically, before they do that, they get rid of the retirement, retiree health care,

Jeff Akers:

right? Yeah, they get rid of one thing at a time. And it's like, well, what's the most expensive thing we can get rid of in Maryland, they got rid of the prescription coverage and forced people that were on a Maryland pension to get their own private Part D

BRIAN AKERS:

plans. You're talking about the state of Maryland, and this was a couple years ago, yeah.

Jeff Akers:

Well, the law passed like decade and a half ago, sure, but then it was in the courts for the last decade or so, and now it's finally in effect. This past year, people had to actually get their own Part D prescription plan.

BRIAN AKERS:

Yeah. So what happens is this, is that when you're provided a benefit for your retirement years as a planner, what I think. About is this, what if things change? What can I do about it? And that's one reason we must save money, grow money, to handle these adverse things in our life, where all of a sudden the same employee has to buy new health care, a new prescription drug, right? Right? You're

Jeff Akers:

not expecting that when you're when you retire and they say, Here's your benefits. And think, okay, these are my benefits for the rest of my life. Well, not necessarily.

BRIAN AKERS:

And health care is not guaranteed benefits. It's benefits that can increase in cost. The co pays are going to go up. I believe the consumer of health care is going to have to pay more and more and more to the future,

Jeff Akers:

right? Well, I think about years and years ago, people from Bethlehem Steel thought their pension was that's guaranteed for the rest of my life. And then it wasn't because the company couldn't continue to support it well,

BRIAN AKERS:

but for them and their spouse was the issue, because a spouse ones what got sliced completely.

Jeff Akers:

Yeah. So we need to know what your company offers, and then we need to know what are the if something like that happens, where the retirement plan drops the health coverage, then there's sort of an open enrollment, because you had coverage, and now you've got to change to something else.

BRIAN AKERS:

Say that again, what's open enrollment? Mean open

Jeff Akers:

enrollment where you can sign up for a plan and not be underwritten, sort of guaranteed

BRIAN AKERS:

issue, and that's by private companies or the government. Well,

Jeff Akers:

private companies that they're the ones that do the supplement or Medicare Advantage, so if you lose it all of a sudden because your employer changes their default of your own, then you have to explain that right, and then you have the right to pick right without penalties, and they have something underwriting from the company, sure. Okay, that will make sense. So that's how the people that had to sign up for Part D, they don't have a penalty for not having Part D before, because they had this coverage and it got pulled out from under them.

BRIAN AKERS:

Yeah, I want people to understand how important it is to have the retirement health care as part of your retirement plan, also to understand what your budgets are and be able to handle increasing costs. All very, very important. All a very big topic. We're gonna sing for the fourth quarter,

Jeff Akers:

healthcare costs are increasing, and they will continue to increase. Yeah,

BRIAN AKERS:

so we've been talking about Medicare and retirement healthcare. Now. Jeff is an expert at AKERS, financial group that we bring in as an expert for our clients when we're doing retirement planning to get it right for your decision. This is what we do for a living. Now. I enjoy giving it to Jeff to do this, and Jeff loves this part of the planning. I like the fact that we know it's done right and done well, so we can take care of these issues for you. Winning in retirement is taking care of the hard things so that you can go do the fun things. The win in retirement is knowing that things are taken care of, from the simplest thing of healthcare to the flow of money coming in to everything that you need. And that's what retirement planning does through AKERS Financial Group. You give us a call and we work these things through. So go ahead and give us a call at 833, win, retire. Schedule a free in person meeting with one of our team of advisors. That's 833, win, retire. 833-946-7384. Or go to our website. Are you ready for increasing health costs? We'll talk about this when we return with more of winning and retirement.

Unknown:

You're listening to a pre recorded show, welcome back to winning in retirement. Call 833, win retire now to schedule a visit with Brian and his team and begin winning in retirement once again. Here's Brian AKERS

BRIAN AKERS:

indeed. Welcome back to winning in retirement. I'm Brian AKERS from AKERS Financial Group, and we host a show with Jeff AKERS today. Jeff AKERS, CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNING practitioner. We're both financial advisors through AKERS Financial Group. We work through arcadios capital. Arcadias wealth is our broker dealer. And Ria, we are stock brokers. Register investment advisors, license life and health. I got a property casualty insurance license or certified financial planners. We've seen those tests knocked

Jeff Akers:

them down, and then we do ces every year for something

BRIAN AKERS:

constantly, right? But that education helps us gather information that helps serve our clients best, and over the many years, some together. And throughout it all, what we've been trying our best to do is deliver to our clients what's needed. My reason for radio shows is education to get that out there for people, so they understand how we think, how we work, so they can examine us and then come check us out. They come see us in a free meeting. That free meeting, you sit down and talk about it now, it could be as simple as, Hey, Jeff, I need to have that health care retirement talk before I really get going and you're open to meet with people about that, right? Oh, yeah. I've talked to people about that before, yeah. So radio listeners, you call us. You call us at 833, win retire as 833-946-7384, and just set up a meeting Jeff will go over the situation that you're in and then guide you. And then what we try to do is then offer our services as your advisor,

Jeff Akers:

right? Because we can help with this. But then we can also help with we talked about the cost of health care. We can talk about how you're going to pay for what you need,

BRIAN AKERS:

and also the cost of advisor. We are considered a fee and or commission, depending on what's best. We're an independent financial services and so we tried to design and work from planning the full implementation, and that's really a combination of how we set up AKERS Financial Group to take care of our clients and the future clients.

Jeff Akers:

The part I love about the independent is there's no one who tells us, you must sell this thing, right? You know, we get to choose what's best for a client, right? And

BRIAN AKERS:

we take that very seriously with our investment committees and our evaluations of what's going on and trying to build a portfolio out through diversification, meaning the goals with the least amount of risk, and having other lots of other concepts, right?

Jeff Akers:

It allows us to make make sure that the client comes first. Yeah,

BRIAN AKERS:

so today, we put together a show called Medicare and retirement health care, because we believe this is one of the big decisions of your retirement year, and then in retirement years, it's something you have to examine each year to make sure you're staying up with what you need best, right?

Jeff Akers:

We got to make the next right decision every step of the way, all

BRIAN AKERS:

right? So I like the idea of building financial planning to be inflation proof, but we don't know how to control the health care costs. Do we?

Jeff Akers:

Jeff, well, there's parts of it that we just can't control. We're at the mercy of the government. When they like, for Social Security, they'll tell you every year, all right, here's the raise that you're going to get next year. But then a couple of weeks later, they send a notice for Medicare that says, Oh, and here's how much Part B has gone up in price. Have they done that for 2026 yet we've got estimates, all right? And the

BRIAN AKERS:

estimate is what?

Jeff Akers:

Drum roll, yeah. So for Medicare Part B, this year, it's been $185

BRIAN AKERS:

a month. This year being 2025,

Jeff Akers:

2025, 2026, it's going to be 206, 50, which is about an 11% increase,

BRIAN AKERS:

all right. So if they raise so security, 2.5 2.7 and then 11.7

Jeff Akers:

whatever you said, right, right? Adela, it's just a tick below 11.

BRIAN AKERS:

11% right? 11% that trying to figure out, does that math work?

Jeff Akers:

Well, it works in that your social security payment started out higher than$185 sure started out lower than that. You're in trouble, right? But as long as you get a raise of at least $20 in your Social Security, then your Medicare premium is going to go up by that $20 so if you get a $30 raise in Social Security, you're really only going to see 10 so let's say

BRIAN AKERS:

you only get a $10 raise social security. How much will Medicare charge you?

Jeff Akers:

Well, Medicare cannot decrease the amount of your Social Security that you get, so you end up getting the same amount of Social Security next year as you were getting this year. So

BRIAN AKERS:

in that example, if you got $10 increase, you'd get you pay $10

Jeff Akers:

right there, there'd be a $10 increase in Medicare, but down the road, eventually your Social Security increase is going to be more than the Medicare increase was, and then they go back and make up for what they didn't charge you before.

BRIAN AKERS:

Oh, wow. Okay, so the idea is this in planning, especially long term planning on Medicare and Social Security planning, we think social security is going to be rather flat for our retirement years, because Medicare one of the most expensive parts of the federal government, of all the budgets, all the future possible debt of the country, Medicare is one of those big pieces out there, and we see that as a form of a tax. The premium is a form of sharing costs that's going to come at us and Addison at us to the

Jeff Akers:

future, right? And we haven't really gotten into this, and we won't go deep into it, but if your income is high enough, you actually pay extra for your Medicare Part B,

BRIAN AKERS:

that's called Irma, income related monthly adjustment amount, yes, and those are based on income that you do. So let's say the money you're making here in 25 will affect your 2027

Jeff Akers:

Medicare premiums, right? Sometimes people get confused about why does what I earned two years ago affect what I'm paying now? But the answer has to do with for 2025 you're going to do your taxes next year. The tax the real tax deadline is October, so the government's not going to know what you made in 2025 until the end of 2026 and then they use that to determine your 2027

BRIAN AKERS:

premiums. Absolutely. So the idea is means testing of Medicare. And all of our talks about Social Security, we always bring up the idea that means testing, testing is a coming on

Jeff Akers:

Social Security someday, if you've got the means they're going to test it. Well, the

BRIAN AKERS:

idea there is Roth, conversion, income, planning, lots of planning topics to help handle all this. So I'm a financial planner, through and through and planning everything. When I think about retirement, I want to know my costs, my fixed costs, what's going to affect us, what's going to be the thing I need to cover. So health care, Medicare and health care during retirement is a big deal. And getting our numbers so that we can then go portfolio design to give you the flow of money to handle it, right?

Jeff Akers:

You got to make sure that you've got the income coming in to pay all your bills. And this is just one of the bigger bills that you're going to have.

BRIAN AKERS:

Yeah. So we love for people to be out of debt. And retirement no bills makes retire very simple. And even retire early, right? Fire, financial independence. Retire early. I like to like that saying it's a fun thing to research Fire, fire financial independence, retire early. Is that like a movement among people out there?

Jeff Akers:

Oh, so you kind of fire yourself, I guess. Well,

BRIAN AKERS:

you get all fired up. Oh, fire. The idea of financial independence, for those that never thought about it, is you have enough money, you saved, you know your budget, you know your numbers, you projected things out, and you have enough, right? And then you work because you choose to. I think of

Jeff Akers:

financial independence is your employer needs you more than you need them.

BRIAN AKERS:

Yeah, that's not a bad way of putting it, unless you're the employer.

Jeff Akers:

I said that last week, and Brian's like, is that what you're thinking

BRIAN AKERS:

about me? Well, as an employer, I love my employees. I enjoy having them, and I'd like to have them for as long as possible, because that's part of the company. The hardest part is that transition when people retire is replacing them, and great employees are hard to replace quickly. That's true with a high quality person. I think a new employee takes two or three years to truly fit in the team and know the roles and re establish,

Jeff Akers:

right, right? It, it can be a challenge. And anybody out there who owns a small business, you know exactly what Brian's talking about, it's difficult to find good people. And when you do find someone who's really good, you still got to train them from Ground Zero to get to what you need.

BRIAN AKERS:

Yeah, you gotta call you have to be trained in what the process they do. So AKERS financial we have a financial fingerprint. We have the AKERS way, the philosophies, all that takes time to learn, right? And that's just the baseline. All right, so as we're talking about inflation and healthcare and Medicare and retirement healthcare, I want you, Jeff, to close your eyes, oh boy, and get ready for my questions. All right, the question number one is this medicare supplement, not Medicare Advantage. Medicare Supplement. I want to travel. I want to travel in all around the United States. What supplement plan would be best for me?

Jeff Akers:

So which of the plans is what you're thinking? Yeah, and, well, my personal pick right now is Plan G. G is in great, great. It just, it covers the most. It will probably be the most expensive of the plans, but it covers the most.

BRIAN AKERS:

G is actually golf on military terms. I think, oh, okay, it's not Gecko, no, sponsored. You don't sponsor that, alright, so you're saying, gee, would be the one that allowed me to travel the United States? Let's say I want to travel around the world. Does Medicare cover me traveling? Or what goes on there? It's

Jeff Akers:

very limited. So you're going to need, when you're going to travel outside the country, you need to get travel insurance for that kind of thing,

BRIAN AKERS:

and that sort of like Medicare, your health, your supplement, then the travel insurance covers or whatever order.

Jeff Akers:

Well, they the travel insurance gets you back into the country, takes care of whatever emergency is while you're overseas, and then gets you back into the US, and then Medicare picks up from there.

BRIAN AKERS:

How about we're on a cruise,

Jeff Akers:

on a cruise ship. It's still better off having that travel insurance because, you know, somebody has a heart attack on a cruise ship. I know it's awful, and they've got to get to a hospital. I mean, cruise ships have a lot of things, but they don't always have that. So you might need a helicopter ride from the cruise ship on the shore. That's really expensive, right?

BRIAN AKERS:

So checking the box for that, or buying an annual policy that you're for travel that you can just report to them when you're traveling, is not a bad idea for retirement planning, especially those on the go. If

Jeff Akers:

you know you're going to do a lot of traveling on cruises or out of the country or whatever, and have an annual policy is fine for that. Yeah,

BRIAN AKERS:

absolutely. So the idea here is this inflation and the cost of things. We think inflation. We think of price of food. But there's a lot of other inflation. Health care inflation is one that I can almost guarantee is going to be a very big deal the next two decades.

Jeff Akers:

Yes, it will. And there's one other thing that I want to mention, because we're talking about, you know, where Medicare's limitations, and one of them has to do with long term care. Absolutely. People think, Oh, I've got Medicare that'll cover it if I have to go to the nursing home. Well, no,

BRIAN AKERS:

it won't. It'll only cover until you stop improving. It covers

Jeff Akers:

rehab, right? And if you end up on hospice, it covers hospice, okay, but that time in between where you're sick, you can't take care of yourself. You need care that doesn't cover that.

BRIAN AKERS:

I believe the definition of hospice has improved greatly under health care over the last 510, years, covering more and more of the final stages and days of people's lives, right? I'm very, very excited, right? There's some flexibility in the it's been really good for people now. Medic. Care and retirement healthcare has been our topic today. Jeff AKERS, from AKERS Financial Group, we would thank you for being here today, covering your expertise that you give us and you help our clients with at all times. My pleasure. Thank you very much. We do. Thank every one of you for listening to our show. If you ever want to go here hear it again. You go to our website, at AKERS financial group.com, that's a k, e, r, s, financial group.com and check us out right there. So we do look forward to meeting with you. We want you to win in your retirement by taking advantage of the opportunity to begin planning with us at AKERS Financial Group to schedule a free meeting with one of our team of advisors. Go to our website at AKERS financial group.com scroll through the schedule meeting section and let us know you'd like to schedule your free meeting right there. Or you can give us a call at 833, win retire as a three, 3w, I n, r, e, t, I R, E, we'll give you a call on Monday to schedule a free in person meeting with one of our team of advisors. Start planning for your retirement now. Go to AKERS Financial Group Comm, or call us at 833-946-7384, thank you for listening. I'm Brian AKERS from AKERS Financial Group, and we want you to be winning in retirement.

Unknown:

You've been listening to winning in retirement with your host, Brian AKERS of AKERS Financial Group. AKERS Financial Group offers securities through arcadios capital and SIPC and FINRA member firm. Advisory services are provided through arcadios wealth. AKERS Financial Group and arcadios do not share any common ownership. Neither arcadios nor AKERS Financial Group provides tax or legal advice. Advice given on winning in retirement is general in nature, and one should seek further advice from their financial advisor, broker, attorney andor tax accountant before investing, be sure to read each prospectus carefully to understand all the risks associated with each investment. Examples and scenarios shared are meant to be for illustrative purposes only past performance is not indicative of future results.