Entrepreneurship & the Family: Health Insurance
One of the most important topics of being an entrepreneur and having a family is health insurance. Let’s just say that there are no “shortcuts” or great health insurance discounts for entrepreneurs — I remember Paul Allen writing about this same topic 2 years ago saying that the lack of health insurance was one of the biggest “damper’s” on entrepreneurship. The cost of health care is continually increasing, which makes it more and more difficult for entrepreneurs.
During the beginning stages of FundingUniverse, we all just had personal and/or student health insurance (some of us were still taking night classes in the beginning)… so it wasn’t that big of an issue. When we raised our first round, we decided to test the waters to have company health insurance benefits. Getting health insurance for a small company is about the same as getting health insurance for a family — they look at each team member to determine your initial rates. We ended having a few “pre-existing” conditions that raised the prices of our company health insurance dramatically — so we passed.
Since then, we’ve looked into getting company health insurance a few times…and we just keep passing. We have found that getting individual health insurance is more cost effective for everyone — and we offer other perks & benefits to make up for it.
If you are looking for health insurance, I recommend eHealthInsurance.com. My wife and I have gone through the process a couple of times (testing insurance brokers and online tools), and we have found that eHealthInsurance has been the most productive.
I’m glad to see that Governor Huntsman is starting to make an effort to help with small business health care. For those of us with families, it is a huge issue to taking the step into the life of entrepreneurship. (I’m especially thankful after my boy had to go to the emergency room on Thanksgiving after he hit his head on the head board while jumping on the bed with his cousins! Probably won’t be the last time that he gets stitches.)
Hey Brock, good info here. Your son sounds like mine…..(stitches i mean) As a fellow entrepreneur I remember having a heck of a time finding affordable insurance benefits for my family, employees and myself. Finally i found this company UHB on the web at http://www.unitedhealthbenefits.com there i was able to get just what i needed. it’s been 2+ years now and so far so good.
A few quick words based on my background. Individual health insurance is generally less expensive than group since the individual product is reviewed for health issues and if there are any, the policy applied for may be declined or qualified w/ restrictions.
Group on the other hand, in many instances is issued even if there are medical issues w/ some of the applicants. Thus group policies can have higher claim costs and therefore higher rates to recover the expenses.
For those who are healthy yet having trouble paying for health insurance, think about buying a “Hospital Expense” policy w/ a good company which has a $1,000 or greater deductible. The premium savings can be substantial.
Being admitted to a hospital because of a sickness or injury can accumulate ten’s of thousands of dollars in bills in just a matter of days, so in my opinion, the most “bang for the buck” is in this type of policy.
Well, I’m going on three years with no health insurance for my family of SIX. Luckily I am a pediatrician with a house call platform, so caring for my own kids is not so scary for me, but it would be nice to actually have a doctor for myself. I agree that any entrepeneur take advantage of a high deductible plan at 3,500 G’s a year rather than full coverage 13,500 in 2007. Don’t forget that of the full coverage plan 30 cents on the dollar goes directly to the shareholders of Blue Cross, Aetna and United Health care. If you are hit by a bus, you will be covered after your grand or two grand five deductible. I am going out on a limb here, but a whole focus of my company is to sell our affiliate memberships to companies in conjunction with High Deductible/HSA combination. ( our affiliate membership fees come out pretax)
And remember the latest on percentage of families denied insurance for ” pre existing condition” is 11%. Quite a disgrace for those children with asthma, allergies, other common childhood diagnosis.
Natalie Hodge MD
Ok, I did a little research and 30 cents on the dollar going to health insurance shareholders is certainly on the “wish-list” of many stockholders, but not close to reality. Most companies pay their non-claim operating expenses on half that margin of profit.
As of the uninsured, sure we can take on the sick, we all just have to be willing to pay for them by way of increased health costs or a tax increase.
Best advise I have is get it when you don’t need it, so you will have it when you do.
I wrote a blog about my experience with buying insurance. I’ve found going to an independent agent was a lot easier. I’m young, and still learning about all of the componants that go into purchasing and using insurance.
If you’re interested, you can read the blog here, http://shauna26.wordpress.com/2007/12/12/saving-money-on-insurance/
Thanks,
Shauna
http://www.shauna26.wordpress.com
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