Michigan Insurer Offers Short-Term Health-to-Major Medical Combo

Priority Health selling a short-term health insurance-major medical insurance package that’s designed to help consumers who have lost access to employer-sponsored health coverage avoid any gaps in coverage.

(Related: Short-Term Health Insurers Are Mobilizing, Too: Jeff Smedsrud)

Workers who lose access to employer-sponsored coverage have the right to enrollment in individual major medical insurance, with Affordable Care Act (ACA) premium tax credit subsidies, through the ACA public exchange system.

But getting  ACA coverage in place may take several weeks, and some newly unemployed workers may earn too much to qualify for rich subsidies.

Priority Health is offering workers who’ve lost their jobs due to COVID-19 disruption access to short-term health insurance coverage that starts immediately, along with up to 15 days of retroactive coverage.

The Grand Rapids, Michigan-based carrier is also offering a deductible credit to all new individual enrollees moving into Priority Health short-term coverage from employer group plans. The provision eliminates the need for a new enrollee to have to meet two deductibles in the same year.

The cheapest short-term policy provides coverage with a $2 million annual limit, with a $2,500 deductible and a $3,500 annual maximum, for $129 per month for a 55-year-old.

The policy does not meet ACA individual major medical insurance standards, and it does not cover preventive services.

Priority Health also sells ACA-compliant individual major medical insurance, and it will also help a consumer start to enroll in that coverage at the same time that the consumer is enrolling in the short-term health insurance coverage.

“By combining a short-term plan, to bridge any coverage gap, with a special enrollment in an individual ACA plan, consumers can safely move from their employer-sponsored coverage to a new plan without the risk of going uninsured during the ongoing outbreak,” the company says. “Priority Health is the only health coverage carrier in Michigan who can offer this unique combination that provides gap-free, same day coverage.”

The company says it’s waiving enrollment screenings for the short-term plan for anyone who chooses the short-term health-ACA plan combination approach.

— Read Some States Extend COVID-19 Special Health Insurance Enrollment Periods, on ThinkAdvisor.

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