As a traveling therapist, there are all sorts of things you can, and should, insure. This may end up becoming a multi-part blog, but for now, I want to focus on health insurance and the options you have available. Getting and maintaining steady health insurance can be a challenge when you change jobs, and possibly employers, every few months. Other than going uninsured (awful idea), there are three potential options to keep yourself insured.
Employer Sponsored Health Insurance
If you are working steadily for a single travel therapy staffing agency or for a combination of agencies, taking your employer sponsored program is clearly the way to go. All the agencies I have worked for factor your health program into your pay package. So, if for any reason you are not taking your employer’s insurance, ask if you can get more hourly – I typically get a dollar per hour extra for carrying my own insurance… more on why I carry my own insurance later.
Typically, what agencies have available for choices are good plans that cover you with providers nationally. When you accept a plan from your employer, you are not subject to pre-existing conditions or other demographic categories that might cause your rate to be higher – you pay into the group price that the insurance has contracted with your employer, simple and right to the point.
A staffing agency that I worked for when I first started traveling physical therapy would drop you from their insurance if you weren’t actively working for them for 14 consecutive days. This used to scare the heck out of me and force me to get right back to work quickly. If a job wasn’t coming together within 2 weeks of the last assignment, I felt the pressure to take anything that was available so I wouldn’t lose my insurance. The truth is, it doesn’t matter if they drop you from their insurance, COBRA (federal gap insurance) covers you. What COBRA does is extend your employer sponsored program when your employment ends. You have up to 60 days to accept COBRA coverage and it works retroactively. This means, if you are taking anything less than 60 days off between assignments, you can go without insurance and if something happens, you can adopt COBRA after-the-fact and you will be covered under your previous plan. The catch is that COBRA is not cheap – unless you need it, then it is a great deal cheaper versus the medical bills you would otherwise incur. Once you have adopted COBRA, you can keep it active for up to 18 months, but in most cases, if you need insurance for more than a couple months, it will be much cheaper to go get a plan on the open market.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: Always look for jobs with 2 or 3 agencies, it helps you get a handle on the local markets and gives you more options for assignments that could be a better fit to your needs. One of the big downsides to jumping between companies is all the “new hire” paperwork – which includes a few healthcare enrollment forms. Don’t worry about the paperwork, the benefits of searching with a few companies outweighs the burden of a couple hours of paperwork every few months. Paper work, JCO quizzes, and constant TB tests are a part of being a traveling therapist, deal with it.
Pros: Everything. Take this option if you are consistently working through agencies. You pay the employer rate and are not subject to rate increases for pre-existing conditions.
Cons: Becomes expensive and complicated if you take more than 60 days off between assignments or do independent contracts. You may have to take short-term insurance to fill these gaps.
Short-term Insurance
Doing a single independent contract? Taking a few months off from therapy to just travel? Unexpected circumstances keeping you out of work for >60 days? This might be the option for you.
The job I work every winter in a Colorado ski town is arranged directly with the hospital and does not offer health insurance for my seasonal position. This can be more common that you would think, especially with seasonal positions in resort towns. Frequently these facilities will not hire through agencies and rely on independent contacts for their seasonal hiring. The first couple of years I worked in Colorado, I got temporary insurance plans, and they were the perfect fit for my needs.
These plans last up to 6 months, are cheap, and are available through most insurance brokers. I got mine through eHealth.com, but I really have no allegiance to them and you should be able to get a temporary health plan through any insurance broker. The downside to these plans are that they only cover conditions that happen during the 6 months you have the plan. Any pre-existing conditions are not covered. If you have an injury or illness that extends beyond the 6 month period that is insured, payment will stop after the last day your plan covers. Also, there is no gap coverage, like COBRA, that would help you if you ended up with no insurance and an injury immediately following the completion of your temporary plan.
Pros: Cheap. Keeps you are covered for any 6 month period where you don’t have other insurance.
Cons: Covers only that 6 months period. Nothing that started before that 6 months, nothing that extends beyond that 6 months. No preventative care coverage.
The Open Market
If you find yourself, like myself, doing frequent independent contracts or in a repetitive rotation to a facility that doesn’t provide health insurance, then the open market might be your only choice. The open market can be unforgiving in its cost. I choose to find insurance through a broker who can compare rates and plans of multiple companies, or you can just go online and start searching rates by individual companies. You’ll find different insurance companies available in different states, and even certain companies are conspicuously absent from specific zip codes due to local laws or other factors. You should always apply for health insurance in your home state and at your home address. It may be tempting to get insurance in a state you are working in if they have lower rates than your home state, but by getting insurance at your home address, you are ensuring the insurer (pun intended) will cover you when you travel temporarily for work. Also, having your insurance based at your home address is one more feather in your cap if you ever have to defend the location of your tax home. It’s worth mentioning that when buying an insurance plan in the open market, there are some plans that only have in-network providers locally. You should make sure that the plan will cover you and has providers nationally – especially when buying from a state’s healthcare exchange marketplace (state Affordable Care Act plans). If you do end up with a plan that has providers nationally, but you happen to be in an area isolated from those providers, there are typically ways of getting your care covered in-network by contacting your health insurance company – I have had success getting in-network coverage with United Healthcare when working in “far out” places.
State healthcare exchanges offer a good place for you to go and find a plan – so whether you are looking for a subsidy or not, you may want to start there and see what’s available. I almost hate to even mention the subsidies available through the ACA. I don’t think traveling therapists are who the subsidies are intended for, but at the same time, buying your own insurance can be expensive, so you might as well get as much help as you can. I know, with my half year working fully-taxed in my home state of Colorado, that my taxed income is too much for me to qualify for a health insurance subsidy. However, those of you working the entire year in situations that are heavily tax-free and for therapists that are recently graduated from school, I bet you’ll qualify for a subsidy to help with your health insurance plan. The one catch with the subsidy is that even though it’s called a subsidy, it’s really a tax credit that you’ll receive when you do your federal tax return, and if your income is more than expected through the year, your actual subsidy can be decreased. Proceed with caution. Here’s a link that provides good, easily understandable information about the health insurance subsidies: http://obamacarefacts.com/obamacare-subsidies/
Pros: It might be your only choice. It will travel with you where ever you go.
Cons: Can be expensive, rates are even higher if you have pre-existing conditions. You must make sure your plan covers you nationally.
