On Nov. 16, 2017 the District Office sponsored presentations on Medicare by Anthem and Kaiser representatives at the Performing Arts Center at Oxnard College. They included basics on what Medicare covers, how to enroll in Medicare, Medicare premium costs, and how Medicare coordinates with Anthem Blue Cross or Kaiser, depending on which coverage you have. The District Office Presentation, 2017 Retiree Benefits PowerPoint, explains the coverage that each retiree has depending on their hire and retirement date. The main presentations regarding Medicare are covered in the Kaiser Medicare 101 Educational Seminar presentation and the Anthem & Coordination with Medicare presentation.
For retirees looking to stay active and keep that old grey matter humming, CSU Channel Islands, situated about 5 miles south of the 101 Freeway on Lewis Road in Camarillo, is beginning its Spring lifelong learning courses on January 22, 2018.
Here is a quick glance of their upcoming Spring session courses. Be sure to download their catalog to get a complete description of each course.
ALSO PLEASE NOTE that any retiree interested in TEACHING A COURSE through OLLI can propose a course for consideration. See Teaching for OLLI for more details.
All retirees and their spouses need to seriously consider attending the MEDICARE SEMINAR at Oxnard College that is being sponsored by the Ventura County Community College District.
The MEDICARE SEMINAR will take place in the Oxnard College Performing Arts Center from 4:30 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. at 4000 So. Rose Ave., Oxnard, CA.
I attended one of Jacqueline’s seminars on April 26, 2017 after learning about it at a Benefits Committee meeting chaired by Gary Johnson. For my report on this seminar, see Medicare Anyone? at the What’s New page of the VCCCDRA website.
I know others have attended a similar seminar conducted by Jacqueline, and if you have any comments that you wish to share about attending one of these seminars you can send them to me for inclusion in this blog, or simply fill out a comment below.
Instructions for learning how to scroll up and down a page can be found here. Click on the word “here” to go to a page with instructions.
Linking to a Source
Reading text on a web page can be a much more powerful experience than reading text in a book. You can actually go to another web page by clicking on a link to a source. If a word or phrase is underlined and highlighted in blue or some other color, then it is very likely a link to a source. If you place the moving mouse cursor over the highlighted link, it will change to a hand symbol, which identifies the word or phrase that you are hovering over as a link to a source. Left click on it and it will take you to that source.
Once at the source page, you may find other links of interest on the new web page and if you keep clicking on links you will move from one web page to another and you may wind up a few web pages from where you started.
To get back to the original web page, click on the “back arrow“ at the top left of the browser, “<-“. You may have to click on it more than once to get back to the page you want depending on how many links you clicked from the original page.
As an example, in the previous “Welcome…” article, notice the word Welcome is underlined and highlighted in color. If you click on it with your mouse, it will take you to that article. Try it, and to get back to this web page by clicking on the back arrow as many times as you have to, depending on whether you clicked on links within the “Welcome…” article.
I would recommend your returning to the first article of this blog, and reading it with new eyes, spotting the links spread throughout the article, and going to those sources, which should enrich your reading experience of the article.
Please note that the NEWEST BLOG ENTRIES ARE TO BE FOUND ON THE TOP (SCROLL UP) RIGHT SIDE OF THIS PAGE.
After each one of our Annual General Meetings, I have often wondered how many retirees walk away with questions on their minds that they didn’t get answered, or formulate questions a few days or weeks later after the meeting.
This “blog” is offered as an experimental service to provide a means for our retirees to communicate with each other regarding questions that may have lingered after one of our meetings. Of course it can also serve as a communication tool for discussion of any topic of interest that is on a retiree person’s mind, or their spouses and dependents. This blog could essentially provide a relatively active means for opening up a dialogue among retirees (or potential retirees — active employees are welcome to participate) on topics of common and current interest. It can also serve as a place where local experts on Medicare, or healthcare topics in general, can submit timely articles of interest, or retirees themselves can write articles about personal experiences that can benefit all of us by knowing about it.
As an example, a common question asked by Tier 1 retirees (those retiring with lifetime benefits) is… should they enroll in Medicare Part B? These retirees are not required to enroll in Medicare Part B, but should they? The Benefits Committee and the Exec Board of the VCCCDRA have been looking into this question for a while and are not quite ready to provide a definitive answer. One of our retirees, Don Medley, did offer up his reasons why he thinks it is a good idea for retirees to enroll in Medicare Part B in The Monitor, Winter 2010 issue of the VCCCDRA newsletter, which we encourage you to read.
But for now, the one category of individuals who we think should seriously consider enrolling in Medicare Part B when they turn 65 are the spouses of retirees with lifetime benefits. The reason is that spouses of retirees will lose their healthcare benefits if the retiree dies. The spouse will be covered by the district healthcare plan for only a very brief time afterwards. Don’t wait to enroll. There is a 10% permanent penalty that is imposed on premiums for each year a person does not enroll after the age of 65. Wait three years and pay 30% more on premiums from then on. See the article “Medicare, Anyone?” in the What’s New web page of the vcccdra.org retiree website for a contact person from Anthem who would be happy to answer any questions you may have about Medicare.
Medicare is part of the retirement healthcare package of Tier 2 retirees with the district paying the premiums for retirees, so there is no question that these retirees will be enrolling in Medicare. However, spouses of these retirees will also lose their healthcare benefits if the retiree dies.
Retirees (and their spouses) of Tiers 3 and 4, most if not all of whom are still active employees, will most definitely want to look into enrolling in Medicare at age 65.
Just as Don Medley above has shared his personal experiences with Medicare Part B and feels positive about it, many of you have had your own personal experiences regarding the pros and cons of being enrolled in Medicare Part B, and we encourage you to share what you think in the comment section, or write an article about it and send it to us for inclusion in this blog. Likewise, if you have any questions or comments on any other topic of interest, please feel free to share them with us. Articles for this blog may be emailed to me here.
