by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2013/02/07 07:31 -05:00, original URI: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2013/02/07/10391881.aspx
So how do I feel, years after The exciting nature of being ordinary and The ordinary nature of being exciting?
Well, pretty ordinary, all things considered.
The new Premera Blue Cross Health Savings Plan has done and had its way with me.
And now that I have to pay $1000 to $3000 in deductible charges of Microsoft's money via a debit card they provide, and that I now have to pay the next $1000 to $3000 of my own money in co-pays, perhaps Microsoft will succeed in transforming the corporate culture at Microsoft from thinking
It's All Free!
to
It's All Covered!
so perhaps Microsoft will succeed in feeling a little more like everyone else in the country when it comes to health care coverage.
And perhaps they will finally get every one of those 100,000 or so full-time employees to start thinking about health care and not letting fraud happen quite as easily or quite as often as they used to let it.
So they win.
Though I'm still going to be making $1000 to $3000 less than I used to.
So I will choose to not neal before Zod (Microsoft) on this one.
Because yes, he was a brilliant military leader who was unappreciated by his people.
But he, like Microsoft, will feel kind of ordinary from here on out.
You win, Microsoft.
But because of the way you won, you have lost something you'll never get back again from me.
Neither my iBot you paid for or the almost $170,000 you spent on me will get that back....
John Cowan on 7 Feb 2013 10:22 AM:
The first and last of all privileges is not to even know what your privileges are. As a former TAB (Temporarily Able-Bodied Person), you ought to know that. When it comes to health insurance, you're *still* greatly privileged.
The rest of us out here in American-health-care land *don't* know that it's all covered. The only assurance we get that our insurance company will cover something is after it's done and they have paid whatever, in their whim, they decide to pay. The $25,000 surprise should be no surprise at all, but somehow it always is.
cheong00 on 15 Feb 2013 6:49 PM:
My company just changed medical plan last year. The clinical fee changed from "free" to "you have to pay $3x for each visit and the insurance company will cover the rest".
Seems companies are less interested to choose good medical insurance than it used to be years before...
Michael S. Kaplan on 17 Feb 2013 8:55 AM:
At Microsoft at least, they want you always paying attention....