Medicare Part A | How to Enroll in Part A (Plus What It Covers and Avoiding Penalties)

Today I'm going to go back to the basics, we're talking about

medicare

part

a, this is the first

part

of

medicare

, so it's definitely important to understand, and we'll also go over how and when to sign up for medicare part a, so stay tuned hey hi my my name is stephanie apt i am a licensed insurance professional and medicare specialist and i create these videos to help people across the country understand and navigate the world of medicare if you haven't already click on the subscribe button that helps my channel to grow, hit the like button and definitely leave questions and comments for me below.

I always love hearing

what

you have to say, so today we're talking about Medicare Part A. This is the first part of Medicare and today we are going to break it down. below

what

is medicare part a how much does it cost what does it cover how and when to sign up for medicare part a and if you stay till the end i am going to share some top tips on who should not sign up for medicare part a and these tips They might sa have a lot of money in tax

penalties

so you'll want to keep an eye on that now there are a few different pieces to the medicare pie there's medicare part a part b part c part d and there's also medigap aka supplemental insurance medicare this is not technically a part of medicare but rather private supplemental insurance plans that fill in the gaps in medicare a and b for the purposes of today we are going to dive into medicare part a this is the part of medicare often referred to as your coverage Hospital care in part a General

covers

inpatient hospital care Skilled nursing facility care Nursing care Non-custodial inpatient and non-custodial long-term care also

covers

hospice and home health care medicare part a is free for most people as long as you have paid medicare taxes for 40 most quarters from us and if you haven't, you'll see the premiums listed here on the screen for part a if you haven't met those quarters, but most people will pay a zero dollar premium for medicare part a if you're collecting benefits Social Security, then Medicare Part A is free and automatic for you when you turn 65.

If you're not collecting social security benefits, then you'll probably want to sign up for medicare part a when you're first eligible and in a moment here I'll show you exactly how and when to do it, as well as who should and who shouldn't Don't sign up for the Medicare Part A, so we've already reviewed that Medicare Part A is free for most people. you have an inpatient hospital stay for which you are responsible for the first 1,408 before your share of benefits kicks in and this is a deductible that resets every 60-day benefit period, so if you have more than one hospital stay in a calendar year, you may have to pay this deductible multiple times once you have met the deductible, medicare part a covers your first 60 days in an inpatient setting and days 61-90, you are responsible for a coinsurance of $352 per day for days 91 and after, you pay $704 per day coinsurance plus medicare part a covers your first 20 days in a skilled nursing facility, but from days 21 to 100 you are responsible to pay 170 dollars per day. medicare supplement insurance to help pay these deductible and coinsurance amounts and most medigap plans you can buy cover all of these expenses from part a to 100 below let's see how to sign up for medicare part a if you are turning 65 years old and you are not collecting social security benefits and you want to

enroll

the easiest way is to apply online at ssa.gov backslash medicare from here you will go to where it says apply for medicare only and you will be asked to create a myss an account a. gov if you don't already have one and once you have created the account you can sign in and you can apply for medicare part a only now when you are applying for part a you will be asked on the application if you also want to apply for medicare part b Now medicare part b has a monthly premium attached to it it's not free like medicare part a is in most cases you'll also want to sign up for medicare part b when you're first eligible However, some people who are still working and have employer-based health coverage will want to sign up for medicare part a only and delay part b and as long as you are actively employed and have health insurance through your employer your employer has 20 or more employees can delay medicare part b without penalty and i have linked a video below that goes into more depth on how and when to delay medicare part b you can also click here for more information on that common question i get They ask ed is should I also delay medicare part a if I'm still working or should I just sign up for part a since it's free and the answer to that question depends that most people will want to apply for medicare part a when they're early eligible, however, you'll want to be aware of

enroll

ing in part a if you have an hsa or health savings account that's checked. ibing tax laws that say you can't make hsa contributions if you're enrolled in medicare part a and b, so If you plan to work after age 65, you have an employer-based HSA plan and you or your employer are contributing to that plan, you should not apply for Medicare Part A or Part B until you are ready to retire or ready to come. outside of that plan another important note when it comes to medicare and hsas if you have an employer based hsa plan and you are working past age 65 and have delayed medicare parts a and b you will want to make sure you stop all contributions to the hsa six months before you enroll in medicare this is because when you apply for medicare part a you get up to six months of retroactive coverage that doesn't go back further than your initial month of eligibility let's give you a real life example let's say you are 68 years old and you delayed medicare a and b when you were first eligible at age 65 because you are actively employed you have an employer-based hsa health plan it is now august and you are planning to retire this month and you want to go ahead and enroll in medicare to get in effective september 1 so when you sign up you can have your medicare part b effective september 1 per your request; however, your medicare part a coverage can be retroactive for up to six months or it could go back to march the first six months before medicare does its part as of the effective date, so you will want to stop all contributions to the hsa from March 6 months before enrolling in Medicare to avoid possible tax

penalties

.

Yes, Medicare has all kinds of rules and tricks. you definitely want to be informed when it comes to your medicare enrollment as well as your medicare supplement plan enrollment because there are certain enrollment windows that if you miss them you could face big penalties down the road that's exactly what we're here for to help. you with i am an independent medicare insurance broker my service is 100 free i am licensed and work with all major insurance companies in most states so chances are we can help you with your medicare plan enrollment and , of course, we will be happy to do it.

Feel free to call us at any time. You can email me or leave your questions and comments below. I'll make sure to reply. Thanks so much for looking. I hope you have learned a bit more about medicare part a see you soon