Category: Benefits & Retirement
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Brown University Health patients have until August 31 to use a special Medicare window after their doctors left UnitedHealthcare’s network
A CMS-approved special enrollment period for Brown University Health patients on UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage closes August 31, 2026, and it reaches a narrow group.
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Income above $109,000 pushes the Medicare Part B premium as high as $689.90 a month, and it is based on your 2024 tax return
The 2026 Part B premium is $202.90, but income above $109,000 adds a surcharge on a six-step ladder topping out at $689.90 a month, scored on a 2024 tax return.
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Medicare’s late drug plan penalty is 1 percent of $38.99 per month, forever
The Part D late enrollment penalty adds 1 percent of the $38.99 national base premium for every full uncovered month, and Medicare adds the result to the premium permanently.
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Medicare covers a skilled nursing stay in full for 20 days, then charges $217 a day and pays nothing past day 100
Part A pays skilled nursing costs in full for 20 days, charges $217 a day from day 21 through 100 in 2026, and covers nothing after that. The 3-day rule decides eligibility.
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Social Security can pursue a dead relative’s overpayment from their estate, and auditors found it skipped that step in nearly half of sampled cases
SSA policy makes a deceased beneficiary’s estate liable for an unpaid overpayment. An August audit found the agency did not follow its required recovery order in 59 of 125 sampled cases.
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Mary Washington Healthcare could leave Humana’s Medicare Advantage network September 1
The Fredericksburg system’s contract with Humana Medicare Advantage expires September 1, 2026 unless a renewal is reached. Emergency care stays protected either way.
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Medicare’s $1,736 hospital deductible resets with each new benefit period, and day 61 starts costing $434 a day
The 2026 Part A hospital deductible is $1,736 per benefit period, not per year, and Medicare caps neither the number of benefit periods nor the day-61 charge of $434.
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Social Security now answers its phone in under a minute, down from 34 minutes
A great deal of Social Security advice quietly assumes the phone is unusable. Call early, call late, expect to be cut off, budget an afternoon. The agency now reports that the hold time behind that advice has effectively disappeared, which changes the calculation for anyone who has been putting off a call for a year…
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UHealth leaves UnitedHealthcare’s Medicare Advantage Preferred Care Network in Miami on January 1
Most contract fights between an insurer and a hospital system end with an announcement that everything is fine. This one ended with an announcement that most of it is fine. UnitedHealthcare and the University of Miami Health System renewed their relationship for commercial, individual and Medicaid coverage — and separately confirmed that one Medicare Advantage…
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Supplemental Security Income pays up to $994 a month, and the $2,000 savings limit has not moved since 1989
Two numbers govern Supplemental Security Income, and they have moved in opposite directions for nearly four decades. One of them is adjusted every January for inflation. The other has been frozen since the first Bush administration. The gap between them is the reason a recipient who manages to save a modest cushion can lose the…
