Receiving Long Term Disability…Now My Medicare Nightmare Begins?
Reader Alert: Many company benefit plans terminate the day you are no longer working full-time. Explore you or your spouse’s group medical plan rules and options with Medicare if you are 65 or older.
Morning Toni:
My wife and I desperately need your guidance because last November, I was rushed to the ER because of kidney failure, which was caused from stage 4 of prostate cancer that had spread to my pelvic bones.
Because I was working full-time, I took a leave of absence with company short term disability on November 15 for 60 days while receiving my cancer treatment. Short term disability ended on January 15th and I was placed on Long Term Disability.
I was informed via a phone call to my hospital room at MD Anderson that I had qualified for long term disability and would no longer be part of the company’s health plan since I was no longer working full-time. COBRA would begin immediately.
My wife and I enrolled and paid for COBRA, so that I could continue with medical care from MD Anderson. It took 6 weeks to get the paperwork to Social Security for me to enroll in Part B, since I was not working full-time and my Medicare Part B began March 1st.
My COBRA nightmare is beginning… because COBRA is only paying the 20% of medical/doctor bills and I was billed the 80% since I was not enrolled in Medicare Part B when Long Term Disability began. Now I owe $40K.What do I need to do?…
