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Starbucks Baristas: The daily grind

Full History - 2021 - 06 - 21 - ID#o4y4g9
2
Signing up for benefits? Health/Dental/Vision? (self.starbucksbaristas)
submitted by RistrettoIsBae
Help! I signed up and don’t know what I’m doing or how to select a plan.
MungotheSquirrel 3 points 2y ago
They have a "guide me" option that will basically give you a survey about how healthy you are, what your preference for risk tolerance is, etc.

In general, the silver plans are what I'd recommend. If you're young, healthy, and risk tolerant, a bronze or bronze plus plan is a decent option. You'd likely pay a lot in the event of an accident or serious illness, but the odds of those may be very low in your case. Silver aren't prohibitily expensive, but cover much more if you need to use it.

Conversely, you'd have to have really high medical usage to make the gold plans balance out in your favor. My fiance and I both have fairly high medical usage, but had to stop doing gold a couple years ago when they made them hella expensive.

One thing to check before you commit is that the clinics and doctors you want are in network on the plan you choose. The Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan was listed as the cheapest of the silver options for us, but I'm glad I checked because NONE of my doctors (at really big, normal clinics) are covered by it this year.

The vision and dental coverage options are all really inexpensive, so I've always chosen gold plans with those since it's such a small cost increase from silver or below.
MungotheSquirrel 3 points 2y ago
Also, I assume you're doing this now because you were hired recently and this is your first opportunity. General open enrollment is in August for the fiscal year that starts in October, so you'll be signing up again in a couple months and will be able to make changes again if you choose poorly now. Even though you're signing up now, you'll HAVE TO do it again in August, or you won't be covered after Sept. What you're choosing now is your insurance from July 1 through Sept 30.
throwaway3456678 1 points 2y ago
Just out of curiosity but how do you find doctors that are in network? I don’t have a regular doctor and probably should find one incase I get sick haha
MungotheSquirrel 1 points 2y ago
If you go to the benefits site and click on your medical plan, it should link to your plan's website. That website will have a button, probably pretty obvious that says "Find a Doctor." You can search by radius to you then and it will only suggest in network doctors. Your yearly checkup will be free!
RistrettoIsBae [OP] 1 points 2y ago
Of this year?
MungotheSquirrel 2 points 2y ago
Yep. Because of when you were hired, it just happens that you're making this choice for a really short amount of time. I can imagine that you might miss the open enrollment then thinking that you didn't have to do it again since you just did this--you do have to do it again. The plans may change prices or coverage starting in October, so they can't just change that on you without having you make a new conscious choice on what you want. So maybe consider this a practice run for a few months. Or maybe if you're healthy, go ahead with a bronze plan for these few months if you want, save a few bucks, and enroll in the safer silver plan for the coming year.
RistrettoIsBae [OP] 1 points 2y ago
I can’t find the the guide me button, though?
MungotheSquirrel 1 points 2y ago
Okay, You're totally right, I can't find that link on the current pages either. They do have the chart of per-paycheck costs on the mybuxben.com, and below have the breakdowns of some costs. They may be building a new calculator to have available during open enrollment, or they may have done away with it, I'm not sure.

In the short amount of time between now and when you'll choose again, hopefully it's unlikely that you'd care about meeting your deductible or annual max, but a couple things that you might care about:

Prescriptions: bronze plans, you pay 25% after the deductible (i.e. potentially A LOT); silver plans you pay either $12/$50/$70 per prescription, depending on what tier it's in. Lots of common drugs are in tier 1, so $12.

Doctors visits: bronze, you pay 25% after deductible; silver: you pay $30 flat, or $50 flat if it's a specialist. Preventive care is fully covered, this is only if you're there for a problem.
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