Health Insurance - Public Charge Rule

[Immi896 4]

I have been reading a lot about not having health insurance can cause problems in spouse visa and I am not sure how i can buy health insurance for my wife who live outside the US.

 

I am self employed and i used to have insurance but I cancelled because i wasn't using it at all and paying too much money for it. My income is above 250% poverty level and i came across these short term health insurance plans. I was wondering if this kind of health insurance will help with the visa of my wife or not ? I can buy for both of us but just want to make sure if this will help in anyway. Getting insurance from healthcare.gov is just too much money for me because of income.

 

https://www.uhc.com/individual-and-family/short-term-health-insurance

 

Please let me know.

 

Thank you.

 

[zochu 255]

I don't think short-term insurance is for you if you just need it to get your wife into the country ... thats not what it is designed for. 

 

Get health insurance. You may go your entire life without needing it but in the off chance you do need and you don't have it, how will you afford to cover the medical bills?

 

PLUS as your wife's sponsor you are responsible for her until she becomes a citizen, dies, has worked in the states for 10 years etc. You will have a contract between yourself and the US government that means that IF she uses government benefits, example, mediaid then you will still need to pay it back. 

[Immi896 4]

i totally understand my contract and i will get the health insurance eventually when she is here but how am i suppose to get the insurance for her without any Social security or any legal papers? When you go fill up application on market place the way they identify you is with your alien number and it wont even let you continue without it

Edited October 23, 2019 by Immi896

[Immi896 4]

what am i trying to ask is how to give proof to the consular at the time of interview, if I just have an insurance will be enough for proving that she will have insurance ?

[zochu 255]

I dont have a SSN and my husband put me on Tricare when he was military. 

 

I assume then, if your wife provides sufficient evidence that you have health insurance and that you are planning to put her on when she arrives? She might also need some type of travel insurance that will cover her in the interim too. 

[carmel34 3,633]

All you need is a name and date of birth to get health insurance in the US for your wife who lives abroad.

[Immi896 4]

if that's the case then great i will talk to some insurance company and get it done. Thanks for your help!

[HalfWayMark 8]

1 hour ago, carmel34 said:

All you need is a name and date of birth to get health insurance in the US for your wife who lives abroad.

That's probably not true in all states (unless you're referring to putting a spouse on employer's insurance, which isn't the case for the OP).  It's certainly not true in Washington state.

 

My wife immigrated about 2 months ago in early September. We moved here from the Philippines. I don't have employer-provided health insurance, so I knew I'd have to enroll her on my own -- either through the ACA or with private insurance. This was just for our own peace of mind, not because there was a "mandatory coverage" policy in effect for immigrants at the time.

 

I spent 3 months before the arrival trying to line up US health insurance for her. I'm referring to "essential minimum coverage" as defined under the ACA. The alternative is a short-term health plan, which if you read the fine print or reviews on any of the products, are rated as one notch above worthless. But hopefully, it's better than nothing.

 

In Washington state, it's impossible to register for "essential minimum coverage" a prospective resident who isn't yet physically in the state. This was true both for my wife (yet without a SSN) and for our child (who was a US citizen with a SSN). I had several email chains to ACA Navigators, private health insurers, and the Washington State Insurance Commissioner's office: it is impossible to register a person under a "qualifying event" (such as immigrating) before the actual event. In addition, once you arrive and receive a SSN, if you sign up for insurance (either through the ACA exchange or with a private insurer), the effective date is the first of the month of the following month -- IF you sign up before the 15th. Otherwise you have to wait up to 6 weeks until the first of the next month.

 

Our only solution was to purchase a short-term medical (STM) insurance policy to cover until October 1st (the first day I knew I could have their coverage in effect). Luckily, no health problems came up in the month of September and we didn't use the insurance. It was basically catastrophic coverage; in Washington state, there is only one STM company authorized to operate in the state, so we were at their mercy.

 

To clarify: this is in Washington state. Other states have their own rules for STM, for "essential minimum coverage" availability, as well as for ACA or Medicaid. Also, I found out that a minor child in Washington state is automatically enrolled in Apple Health (Medicaid) -- as long as you apply -- without regard to "qualifying event" cutoff dates. That's good to know -- the state doesn't want kids to be without health care during the 4- to 6-week waiting period. Adults are on their own. In the end, in early September I applied for health insurance for both my wife and child, and they're now enrolled as of Oct 1.

 

That being said, I don't think much of this applies to the OP. As I understand the new policy, you either have to show insurance coverage, or the ability to pay for it. It would make sense that the coverage under question is ACA "essential minimum coverage', but that's just my guess. In other words, you would simply have proof that you have enough funds to purchase a qualifying insurance policy. If you were employed, you could probably simply add you wife to your policy even before she arrives -- it depends on the employer's signup rules.

 

Edited October 23, 2019 by HalfWayMark

[Immi896 4]

These are the same replies i have heard after talking to bunch of health care providers and that is the main reason i wanted to know what other solutions are. My employers lets us sign up only during the month of June. I definitely can prove from my income that i can afford it but i don't want to rely on that and hope that everything will be okay. Then i saw these short term insurance plans that can work for almost 12 months and i thought until she gets here that might help but apparently a person above says that they are not designed for this purpose.

 

I am just trying to figure out a way to get this problem resolved it doesn't matter to me what kind of insurance it is or how much i have to pay,  as long as it covers most of the health problems and acceptable by new laws. 

 

 

[canadavisa22 202]

32 minutes ago, HalfWayMark said:

That's probably not true in all states (unless you're referring to putting a spouse on employer's insurance, which isn't the case for the OP).  It's certainly not true in Washington state.

 

My wife immigrated about 2 months ago in early September. We moved here from the Philippines. I don't have employer-provided health insurance, so I knew I'd have to enroll her on my own -- either through the ACA or with private insurance. This was just for our own peace of mind, not because there was a "mandatory coverage" policy in effect for immigrants at the time.

 

I spent 3 months before the arrival trying to line up US health insurance for her. I'm referring to "essential minimum coverage" as defined under the ACA. The alternative is a short-term health plan, which if you read the fine print or reviews on any of the products, are rated as one notch above worthless. But hopefully, it's better than nothing.

 

In Washington state, it's impossible to register for "essential minimum coverage" a prospective resident who isn't yet physically in the state. This was true both for my wife (yet without a SSN) and for our child (who was a US citizen with a SSN). I had several email chains to ACA Navigators, private health insurers, and the Washington State Insurance Commissioner's office: it is impossible to register a person under a "qualifying event" (such as immigrating) before the actual event. In addition, once you arrive and receive a SSN, if you sign up for insurance (either through the ACA exchange or with a private insurer), the effective date is the first of the month of the following month -- IF you sign up before the 15th. Otherwise you have to wait up to 6 weeks until the first of the next month.

 

Our only solution was to purchase a short-term medical (STM) insurance policy to cover until October 1st (the first day I knew I could have their coverage in effect). Luckily, no health problems came up in the month of September and we didn't use the insurance. It was basically catastrophic coverage; in Washington state, there is only one STM company authorized to operate in the state, so we were at their mercy.

 

To clarify: this is in Washington state. Other states have their own rules for STM, for "essential minimum coverage" availability, as well as for ACA or Medicaid. Also, I found out that a minor child in Washington state is automatically enrolled in Apple Health (Medicaid) -- as long as you apply -- without regard to "qualifying event" cutoff dates. That's good to know -- the state doesn't want kids to be without health care during the 4- to 6-week waiting period. Adults are on their own. In the end, in early September I applied for health insurance for both my wife and child, and they're now enrolled as of Oct 1.

 

That being said, I don't think much of this applies to the OP. As I understand the new policy, you either have to show insurance coverage, or the ability to pay for it. It would make sense that the coverage under question is ACA "essential minimum coverage', but that's just my guess. In other words, you would simply have proof that you have enough funds to purchase a qualifying insurance policy. If you were employed, you could probably simply add you wife to your policy even before she arrives -- it depends on the employer's signup rules.

 

From the way I understand all of this, you're simply showing that you already have proof of coverage or that you have proof that you will be able to have coverage within 30 days. 

 

How would this even be followed up on though in the case that you have proof of receiving estimates and will purchase long-term coverage once you are in the US?

 

I'm not familiar with how ACA imposes fines on people that are not signed up for it. 

[Bernice Boakye 2]

What date is your wife interview 

[Immi896 4]

just talked to 3 more health care consultants and they all are saying the same thing we cant get you coverage until she is not here. Not sure how people are able to do this if anyone have a name of company that will really help

 

21 minutes ago, Bernice Boakye said:

What date is your wife interview 

i dont even have a date yet, i am just hoping for the best and trying to get everything ready

[Bernice Boakye 2]

Check seven Corners 

[Naes 12,205]

4 hours ago, Immi896 said:

These are the same replies i have heard after talking to bunch of health care providers and that is the main reason i wanted to know what other solutions are. My employers lets us sign up only during the month of June. I definitely can prove from my income that i can afford it but i don't want to rely on that and hope that everything will be okay. Then i saw these short term insurance plans that can work for almost 12 months and i thought until she gets here that might help but apparently a person above says that they are not designed for this purpose.

 

I am just trying to figure out a way to get this problem resolved it doesn't matter to me what kind of insurance it is or how much i have to pay,  as long as it covers most of the health problems and acceptable by new laws. 

 

 

I would think your wife coming to US may count and life change event for you to be able to add her outside of enrollment period. I’m not sure of course but may be worth asking the HR

[Tracie 1]

SEVEN CORNERS INSURANCE from my understanding only covets J1/J2 and its indicated its not an Insurance Policy