There is perhaps no consumer item as highly regulated in terms of product and marketing as health insurance for the 65+ year olds, also known as Medicare. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) regulates marketing materials down to the size and type of font. All literature, advertising, marketing events, telephone scripts must be approved by CMS. All insurance agents who want to sell Medicare Advantage and Part D prescription drug plans must pass yearly tests. CMS can swiftly ‘sanction’ any insurance carrier for breaking the rules, completely removing them from selling any plans for months at a time. There can be no ‘cold’ calling or random marketing by agents.
There are rules galore when it comes to meeting eligible people to discuss medicare advantage plans. For public events, there are strict guidelines on what can be given away, food offered, disclaimers from presenters and specific types of literature. Before an agent can meet with a potential client in their home, a signed Scope of Appointment (SOA) must be filled out by the prospect and returned to the agent before the call. Another method to obtain a SOA is a recorded phone conversation, conducted by a 3rd party, with the potential customer. Once the meeting has begun, no products, except what was agreed upon in the SOA can be discussed. If the client wants to review another product, another SOA must be filled out. If the agent determines the prospect is best suited by a different product, another appointment can be set up no earlier than 48 hours later.
Of course, for the money, orginal Medicare, Medicare Advantage and Part D plans offer superior value. No insurance company is going to offer guaranteed issue health to a 65+ for approximately $120/mon, for most folks, unless it was government subsidized. There is no better socialized medicine than Medicare in America.
Even with the onerous regulations from CMS, there are plenty of insurance companies lined up to sell Medicare Adanvantage plans. It is almost counter-intuitive that large for profit companies would want anything do to with a highly regulated government program. There is little to no competitive advantage that the companies can have because the base plan has a price pre-set by the government.
Yours truly has gone through the testing and is authrorized to sell Medicare Advantage plans. All the regulations actually take the ‘selling’ pressure off the presentation. My primary function is education about medicare and the different plans to the client. I am actually looking forward to presenting Medicare Advantage and Part D plans because these folks deserved affordable health insurance. I don’t really care how government regulated or subsidized it is. It is the right thing to offer.