Taylor Bowker - Mindful Insurance Agency

On Common Mistakes in Medical Billing: "She ended up getting a bill for $14,000 for a pee test."

Health insurance in the United States is a pain.  We all know that.  As business owners, we often get stuck needing to shop for our own insurance.  Only during certain times of year and only with all of these rules.  But how do you buy health insurance, without going crazy?

There is a marketplace, but it isn't exactly like going to buy grapes.  It helps to have an expert on your side, as with most things.  In this case, the expert offers their expertise at no additional cost to you.

Taylor Bowker is the health insurance expert.  She started Mindful Insurance Agency to help people navigate the murky waters of health insurance.  As an entrepreneur, a business owner with multi-state employees, or someone simply trying to make sense of the marketplace, this episode breaks down the trends, challenges, and solutions in health insurance.

Listen as Taylor offers tips on choosing the right coverage, using HSAs, and understanding group versus individual enrollment periods.

Enjoy!

Visit Taylor at: https://mindfulinsuranceagency.com/

 

Podcast Overview:

00:00 "Starting My Own Business"

05:11 Health Insurance vs. Cost Sharing

12:34 Cost Challenges in Employee Insurance

19:59 "Updating Marketplace Applications Challenges"

26:40 "$14K Surprise Medical Bill"

29:26 "Health Insurance Subsidy Reduction Impact"

37:36 Snowbirds, Coverage, and Emergencies

38:45 Healthcare Coverage Tips by Age

45:35 "Streamlined Application Support Platform"

51:59 "Insurance Enrollment Rules Explained"

55:45 Employee Coverage Plan Explanation

01:01:10 "Specializing in Individual Coverage"

01:08:09 QSEHRA Benefits and Marketplace Savings

01:11:50 "HSA Usage and Restrictions"

01:16:07 FSA Contributions and Usage Rules

Sponsors:

Live Video chat with our customers here with LiveSwitch: https://join.liveswitch.com/gfj3m6hnmguz

Some videos have been recorded with Riverside: https://www.riverside.fm/?utm_campaign=campaign_5&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_source=rewardful&via=james-kademan

Podcast Transcription:

Taylor Bowker [00:00:00]:

I saw the largest health insurance increase of my entire career this past open enrollment because these folks no longer qualified for a subsidy because their income— your income could literally go a dollar over the threshold to receive a subsidy and you no longer qualify for $1,000 a month's worth of savings. You could owe, you know, $12,000, $13,000, $14,000, $15,000 back at tax time if you go even a dollar over. So that's kind of where the issue lies.

James [00:00:35]:

You have found Authentic Business Adventures, the business program that brings you the struggle stories and triumphant successes of business owners across the land. Downloadable audio episodes can be found in the podcast link found at drawincustomers.com. We are locally underwritten by the Bank of Sun Prairie, and today we are welcoming slash preparing to learn from Taylor Belker of Mindful Insurance Agency. So Taylor, How is it going today?

Taylor Bowker [00:00:59]:

Hello. Good. Staying warm or attempting to.

James [00:01:02]:

Wisconsin, here we are. So tell me a story. What is Mindful Insurance Agency?

Taylor Bowker [00:01:07]:

Oh, sure. So at Mindful Insurance Agency, we assist individuals and businesses get health insurance, health, dental, and vision. And we are a brokerage. So we are essentially the middle person between the members and the health insurance carriers and just try to advise and educate and help people get health insurance.

James [00:01:30]:

Right on. How do you end up in health insurance?

Taylor Bowker [00:01:33]:

Well, um, so I started in the insurance industry back in 2012. I was 5 years old. I'm just kidding, I was a little bit older than that. Um, yes, yes, yes. Um, so I started very entry-level job at an agency in Waunakee, around town here. Um, again, just doing very entry-level things. And then I shortly got promoted to a business development role. Um, and then from there, there there was a different agency hiring that was focusing on health insurance, and I was ready for a change.

Taylor Bowker [00:02:11]:

They needed a customer service rep, front desk person, so I went there to work, and within a year of me working there, they actually asked me if I wanted to become an agent or a broker, and I had never thought that that was something I wanted to do. Insurance, it can be a very just like cutthroat kind of a situation with sales and quotas and things like that. And that always kind of made me a little nervous. But I am very much a people person. So I, you know, I thought, why not? Let's give it a try. So I got licensed and became an agent back in 2016 now. And then, so started as an agent there doing health, dental, and vision, like I said. And then back in 2019, I decided to start my own business.

James [00:03:05]:

So that's awesome.

Taylor Bowker [00:03:05]:

Yeah, I've been doing that for 6 years now.

James [00:03:08]:

So what was the motivator to start your own gig versus just maintaining with where you were at? Sure.

Taylor Bowker [00:03:12]:

Yeah. Well, I guess I've always kind of just been somebody who works just, I prefer to kind of be on my own. Being my own boss sounded really great. I was in a group of individuals at the time and other business owners, the group that you're in with me now where we met. And again, there were just a lot of business owners there and they were doing a really good job of owning a business. And it just sounded like a feasible option for me and something that I wanted to do. I also felt like I kind of had learned everything I really could being at the place I was at previously. So I figured, you know, why not give it a shot and rip the Band-Aid off? And it's been, yeah, it's been working out well so far.

Taylor Bowker [00:04:00]:

So that's good.

James [00:04:01]:

Right on.

Taylor Bowker [00:04:02]:

Yeah.

James [00:04:02]:

So has health insurance changed much over the past, what are we talking, 9, 10 years?

Taylor Bowker [00:04:08]:

Sure. So I would say yes, yes and no. So I think the biggest thing that's changed is rates, insurance rates.

James [00:04:19]:

They keep going down.

Taylor Bowker [00:04:20]:

Yeah, that would be amazing. No, similar to a lot of other things, they just keep increasing and by a lot, especially the last couple years. So a lot of other products have come into play to try to help mitigate those premium costs for people. There's a lot of other products out there now that aren't necessarily health insurance as it is defined by, you know, the commissioner of insurance, if you will, or the government. But there are other products out there that are designed similarly to help people, you know, still get the care that they need and save money on their premiums and their out-of-pocket costs. So I would say prices have changed and other products have been developed in the market to try to help with those pieces.

James [00:05:08]:

And other products, you mean, I guess, help me what you mean by other understand products.

Taylor Bowker [00:05:11]:

Sure, yeah. So obviously you have typical health insurance. This would be either through, it's all kind of under the Obamacare umbrella as we've known it for a while now. It can be a group plan through an employer that you work with, or it can be an individual plan on the marketplace or direct with an insurance carrier. And that would kind of be your more typical, just average health insurance policy. But as of the last, say, maybe decade, a couple of new products have come out, one of them being referred to as medical cost sharing. So medical cost sharing in layman's terms is essentially a product that you pay a monthly subscription fee for, similar to a premium, and you choose what's called an initial and shareable amount, similar to a deductible, where essentially you're saying, I'm willing to pay this cost upfront in the event that something catastrophic were to happen to me. And so because it's covering you for more catastrophic occurrences and not the full shebang like a regular health insurance policy would,, they tend to be less expensive for certain people in certain situations.

Taylor Bowker [00:06:24]:

Those types of products also work really well for lucky individuals that are more healthy, that don't necessarily use their benefits all the time, but just want something there in case. That also works well with what's called direct primary care, which is a newer model, at least around the Madison area. It's where you work with a primary care doctor directly. So they're not affiliated with any any hospital systems. You do pay them a small monthly subscription fee to utilize their services. However, it's, it's really very worth it because a direct primary care doctor is always going to make sure they have same-day or next-day appointments available for their patients, which is very unheard of nowadays. Yeah, unfortunately. And then they can also do a myriad of things for you, you know, because you're paying that monthly fee.

Taylor Bowker [00:07:18]:

They can run labs for a couple of dollars, which is also very crazy to say. They can run prescriptions for people at cost. If you have an appointment with them, it'll be either a 30-minute or an hour-long time block, which again is not very common if you go to a clinic through a hospital system. They can help you with most acute and even urgent care needs as well. So that can just be, yeah, those two things specifically go hand in hand pretty well together. There's also things out there that have been out there for a while, like short-term policies, you know, through UnitedHealthcare or Allstate or something like that. Those can be less expensive for folks,