Ask The Medicare Specialist

QUESTION:

My wife and I are both clients of Question from Bruce: yours and very happy with our agent. We usually call her 2-3 times a year about billing issues, and she returns our call the same day with answers to our questions. I enjoyed your recent column about how agents get paid, and how some are motivated by commissions only, not what’s in the best interest of the client.

I’m curious how you handle non-clients that walk in your office or just call with Medicare problems. Sometime last year you addressed this issue and stated you were going to have a meeting with all the agents to remedy this issue because how time consuming it can be while not being compensated. You actually mentioned discontinuing the columns due to the burden of time spent working for free with those who aren’t clients. I bring this to your attention because as a client I love the service where I can call with questions and get a quick answer or solution to a problem. That’s a big part of the reason I decided to go with your agency. I worry about your agents getting burned out and then may not having the energy to give the quality service we’ve always received. Can those who are not clients still write questions for your column or just those who signed through your company?

ANSWER:

I’m glad to hear you’re pleased with our services, and we appreciate you being loyal clients.

I want to make sure that if there’s ever an instance where your agent or someone at our office doesn’t call you back the same day you leave a message, which is our policy for any left before 4pm, that you let me know via email. The only exception to this is during Annual Election Period (AEP) when we may literally get 300 or more calls in a day. But even then, we have a 24-hour callback rule. Please never ever hesitate to reach out to myself or call the office for help with anything remotely related to you polices. Anyone, clients or not, can email me or contact one of the offices with questions for the column or of a personal nature. We always try and help anyone who calls and has questions, even if they’re not clients. That’s part of our mission statement actually. We will even put people in our database as “non-commission” clients if they’re already on a plan that suits them best. We then treat them just like they originally purchased their plan through us and provide the same great services that our commissioned clients get. What we would like and hope non-commission clients do is allow us to change their plan if or when that need arises in the future. I estimate that the majority of our clients change plans at least once or more every ten years. Those on Advantage Plans because their benefits take a turn for the worse and/or premiums increase while another plan or company provides better overall value, something we anticipate is going to happen in 2025 and 2026. Those on Supplements change when premiums increase and they can get identical or close to the same coverage at a significant discount.

The reason I wrote the column where I discussed the possibility of no longer running them was because we had a rash of people who made appointments to get our help with absolutely no intention, and even told us so, of allowing us to submit an application on their behalf. They took our advice and went to another agent to make the change. Since I ran that column, we haven’t experienced nearly as much of that, although we’ll see what happens during this AEP. That’s generally when these folks contact us. I ask that people not take up our limited and valuable appointments during AEP from someone who genuinely wants and needs to become a client. We only have so many available slots during those 53 days. We’re happy to help people when they call, but to expect us to do another agent’s job is very discourteous.

Why anyone would want to work with an agent who isn’t capable or willing to give sound advice or they don’t have faith in is beyond my understanding. We sure had our share last AEP, and it was very frustrating for the entire staff. But at the end of the day, we all still love what we do and helping those on Medicare. The number of people like yourself who are appreciative far outnumber those who only have intentions of taking advantage of our kindness and no cost services.

There will be a day when I won’t pay to publish the columns in the paper, both print and online. It’s very expensive and as most people know, The PG is only printed twice per week now. Once the number of new clients we get compensation to enroll dips below the cost of running the columns, that business decision will have to be made. However, I won’t stop writing them. They will still be published on our Facebook group that has the same title as the column. We also run two other exclusive weekly series. “Truth, Tips, and Tricks” discusses some topics we feel are important for those on Medicare to be aware of, how to deal with and avoid them as well as provide tips on how to work through any financial implications they might pose. “Feel Good Fridays” highlights a real problem, issue, or situation a client found themselves in and how their agent solved it, or giving an example and discussing why we love working at The Health Insurance Store and how rewarding it can be.

To join the group, go to our webpage and click on the blue link at the top of the page.

I’m going to focus the next few columns on an updated of version of something I did a few years ago titled “New to Medicare,” a series of nine consecutive columns that focused on directions and advice for those approaching age 65 or others who are working past their 65th and will be going on Part B for the first time at some point. It will begin very soon, possibly next week.