2011 Medicare Cheat Sheet

2011 Medicare Cheat Sheet

Years ago, when I worked for the Social Security Administration, and it ran the whole Medicare program, we would go out and give talks about Medicare. For ready reference, we would always keep a 3x5 index card in one hand, and on it we wrote all the numerical information that changed from year to year. It wasn’t much, usually the Part A inpatient hospital deductible would change, and the other Part A deductibles, and also the Part B premium, and rarely, the Part B deductible. But the point being, every variable could fit on one side of one little index card.

No more! Not only are there more Parts to Medicare now, but the program has become very, very complex. And with this, there are many, many variables which typically change from year to year, and which no one, and certainly not me, can easily remember. To help me, especially when I do counseling, I keep a “cheat sheet” which I update each year. And, to warn you, it’s six pages in an Excel spreadsheet! Goodbye index card!

You can access this by going to the CD that comes with Managing Your Medicare, clicking on the check for any updated forms and instructions link, and printing it out. I keep it color-coded not only to highlight the changes from last year to the current year, but also to help separate the many different topics it covers, and so I strongly recommend that you print it out in color. And note that the last two pages cover only Alaska and Hawaii, respectively, so you probably don’t need to print those pages unless you live in one of those two states. Helpful printing instructions are at the very end of the sheet.

Finally, you should be aware that the information for the next year starts coming out early in the current year, and various items for the next continue to be released as the current year goes along, and even into the next year. So I will begin posting the next year’s cheat sheet late in the current year, but it won’t be fully complete until early in the year it covers. At that point it will be named “Final Cheat Sheet for 2012,” or whatever the year is.