I don’t understand how same sex couples can get a domestic partner covered on health insurance but my boyfriend cant cover me because we are not married? Is this fair? Should we get married sooner then planned just so I can have the health insurance? I have diabetes and need to go to the doctor often and I cannot afford my medications on my own without insurance.
This so totally not fair. We were not planning on getting married for a few more years. Now I feel like I have no choice. I hate to leave my great job but It does not offer the medical insurance I need.
Answer
Same sex partners get that benefit, because in most states they cannot legally marry…
Should you marry earlier than planned for insurance purposes? If that works for you, then go for it. If you were planning on marrying anyway, why not go ahead and do it earlier for more practical purposes? Those types of reasons are why many people marry anyway…not that they don’t love each other, but marriage offers some benefits that simply living together or being an unmarried couple does not.
If have no desire to marry your boyfriend, I wouldn’t suggest legally binding yourself to him solely for insurance reasons. That could backfire in many ways. If your job doesn’t offer insurance and you cannot pay for your own privately, then perhaps finding a job that offers the benefits you need would be the other altnerative to marrying for the SOLE purpose of health insurance.
I don’t understand how same sex couples can get a domestic partner covered on health insurance but my boyfriend cant cover me because we are not married? Is this fair? Should we get married sooner then planned just so I can have the health insurance? I have diabetes and need to go to the doctor often and I cannot afford my medications on my own without insurance.
This so totally not fair. We were not planning on getting married for a few more years. Now I feel like I have no choice. I hate to leave my great job but It does not offer the medical insurance I need.
Welcome to the world. Sam sex couples are offered health insurance because they are not permitted to marry in most states. It is a benefit to retain valuable employees. YOU on the other hand, have the option to marry to gain health insurance. If you don’t plan to get married, don’t. Find a job with medical insurance or get a second job to pay for your medications. I am sympathetic – I know how costly type 1 diabetes is, but nobody said life was fair. You might check with your state about state provided health insurance for people who are unable to get coverage.
Sweetheart, same sex couples cannot GET married at all. Stop whining.
You’re not the only one who is without health insurance. I have none and I have no fiance to cover me. Millions of people make it work, you can, too.
Employers decide if they want to offer “domestic partner” coverage. My fiance & I moved from New Jersey where I worked for a progressive company that gave us the option of “domestic partner” coverage for him to Pennsylvania which is far more conservative (most companies don’t offer “domestic partner” insurance even for same-sex couples) so he lost his coverage.
We were already engaged when we moved so we discussed the matter with our families and they were all supportive of the idea of us marrying legally so he could have medical insurance and continuing with our plans to have the church wedding in Oct ’09 as we had been planning to do.
We ride motorcycles and my fiance races cars so nobody wanted either of us to be without insurance and we couldn’t afford the $700 per month it would have cost us for him to have COBRA coverage.
I wouldn’t suggest you get married just for the insurance, BUT if you had plans to marry, you might want to speed it up in order to get coverage. Our pastor actually commented that he was impressed that we cared more about having medical insurance for eachother than the ‘big day’ – - most people here on YA are pretty negative about why we married legally and that we shouldn’t have the church wedding, but I figured so long as our families were supportive of us, I didn’t care.
do what you want, but ask yourself this, does the insurance cover preexisting conditions?
Talk to him about what he thinks if he is ok with moving the date ahead then its cool.. you two are getting married anyway right
Do what you have to do and protect your health. If you were planning marriage anyway, moving it up may be the answer.
This could be quite a sticky situation you should get married because you love that person are you ready to get married is the question? If you are and your comfortable go for it
Good Luck
Oh quit whining…. Heck yes it’s fair, and NO you should not get married for insurance benefits.
Think about the flaw in your argument – we tell same sex couples they can’t be married and some states tell them they can have a DP which is “close enough” to marriage…. DPs are in a committed relationship yet they can NOT get married. Your argument is childish – I cant get what I want so I’ll blame someone else.
YOU have a choice whether or not and when you get married… Same-Sex couples do NOT, so if an employer chooses to treat a DP with the weight of marriage for issuing benefits – YAY for them. In the states that “allow” domestic partnerships, it is a ‘status’ granted by cities/counties/states so it is more than living together, but far short of marriage. Yet it is somehow the ‘best’ we’re willing to offer a large segment of our population.
How is your situation not fair? You are upset because you’re not treated like a second-class citizen? You are upset because you can’t have what you want when you want it? You choose not to be married and cry because you aren’t getting special treatment? You chose to work for your employer, and you chose to participate in their insurance – or chose to work for an employer that doesn’t offer it. SInce you have SUCH a great job go find an insurance plan that provides the coverage you want and buy it – just like the rest of us that don’t have employer-provided health plans or -here’s a novel idea, get a different job with the benefits you want.
Er that’s wrong. Same sex couples CAN get married in 5 states and some insurance companies will allow boyfriend and girlfriend to claim each other as domestic partners.
I know a lot of people who are in this position right now. You can go to your state welfare office and get put on Medicaid if your job doesn’t offer insurance.
My good friends are in this position right now. She has a blood disorder that her insurance won’t cover for a year because of pre existing condition and her medicines add up to $700 a month. Not to mention co pays and office visit charges. Her lab work is basically making them broke every month.
They are thinking about just getting married so she can be added to his insurance.
It’s tough. I don’t like the idea of couples getting married on paper and then having the big day later, but there are exceptions like the military deployment and what not.
If I were you I would try to see what a single plan would cost from like Blue Cross Blue Shield or Cigna. I know Coventry Healthcare offers single plans.
Do your research though. Does your fiance’s plan have a pre-x clause? If so, they won’t cover your condition for at least a year. If you had active coverage in the last 63 days then HIPPA says insurance has to waive pre-x. Sounds like you didn’t have previous insurance so that is the first thing you want to check. You don’t want to go through the trouble of getting married on paper just to find out his insurance isn’t going to pay for your medicines and visits for a year. Second, find out how much more a month the premiums will cost to have a participate+spouse on the plan. It may be cheaper to find a single plan for yourself.
Good luck!
maybe go to the courthouse and get married, so you are covered by his insurance, then you can still have a big wedding in a few years like you planned. good luck, it is unfair.
please answer mine thank you http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?…
I would go to the justice of the peace and get married legally so you can use his insurance.
Then just plan your actual ceremony for a couple of years from now when you want it.
= ) good luck.
Do you and your boyfriend live together? That’s pretty much called being domestic partners at that point and at least where I work, if you live together, you can get insurance coverage.
Anyway, if you do plan on getting married, it’s not a big deal to just do it early for the benefits. I really don’t care about ‘being married’ as a title in itself, I was devoted to my husband forever whether or not we had it on papers. I think it’s unfair that same sex couples can’t get married and I’m glad they are able to get some benefits in some places (hopefully this gets better). The main reason I got married was for the benefits, so my husband and I can save money on taxes and have less issues getting insurance together no matter where we work.
If it’s a health situation, such as your diabetes, then you should put aside too much of the emotional aspect of marriage. You can get legally married now and have the wedding you want on the anniversary of whatever year. Or just throw a wedding now. And make sure the insurance of your boyfriend’s company means any domestic partner (you just have to live together), because I have a feeling that you can still be covered.
Yes it is fair considering that same-sex couples aren’t able to marry at all. It’s up to the employer to decide what they allow and what they don’t. If you don’t like it, too bad. If you decide to get married now, that will be your wedding and you don’t get a do-over in the future because you had to make sacrifices like everyone else on the planet who is an adult and knows how to act like one.
If you want the insurance and all the benefits of a legally married couple, then you have to go through the lenght and make it official.
What’s next? GF wanting 50% of the assets too?
Good luck
While I am empathetic about your dilemma, I must mention that I’ve read two questions on here so far this afternoon about getting married to get covered under health insurance. I am assuming both question askers are American. If this is the case, why are so many Americans dead set against the health care plan the President Obama is trying to create? Americans are so scared to have anything close to what Canadians have – yet you would never see one of us on here asking about getting married for the health insurance.
We also have the ability to become common law in order to share benefits, so long as you have been living together between six months or a year (depending on the province). My fiance and I are common law and share benefits. I never would have wanted to rush our wedding just so I could get prescriptions for free without having a job that offers benefits.
Finally, Canadians have the right under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to marry their same sex partner. This seems a lot more fair then only being “domestic partners” when what they really want to be is married.
Here are your choices:
A) Find out if there is an option for you to share benefits with a common law marital status where you live. If that option is available to you, do that.
B) If you are okay with it, then go ahead and get married. But I know personally, I wouldn’t want to rush my wedding because I want the day to be special and that requires time to plan rather than rushing into it for health benefits. When Obama’s health insurance plan requires a vote, or a vote in Congress, write to whoever you need to write to so that they know it’s time all Americans get access to health insurance.
C) Find a job that offers health benefits so you are covered under your own and do not need to worry about being covered under your fiance’s.
What did you do about your medical needs BEFORE you and your boyfriend were contemplating marriage – how did you get along before that?
And if you did get married, what would you do if your husband was severely injured and could no longer work, and you were suddenly the only breadwinner for the home, continuing in your “great job” that has no health coverage for either of you?
Statistically speaking, most women become widows – women outlive their husbands. You should have the ability to stand on your own financially – don’t depend on your boyfriend exclusively to pull you through this quandry.
Getting married for health benefits is a bad idea. Stay at your great job for the meantime, while aggressively looking for a job that has medical benefits. Remember that not all insurance plans cover pre-existing conditions, and most plans have a waiting period.
Insurance benefits are part of what makes a job great – it helps preserve your income and your security and peace of mind. Cruise on over to the Marriage/Divorce section, and just ask how many couples argue about money.
And while you’re on the subject of money, how often do you and your boyfriend talk about money?