How to change my health insurance from Covered California halfway through the year?
Hi everyone! I appreciate any and all answers here.
So I just filed my taxes for 2024 and my HR Block representative said that she urges me to switch from Covered California as soon as possible. In 2024 I had medical issues that caused me to lose my job so I switched from employer provided insurance to Covered California starting last May 2024 with the cost being $94/month. Then in August 2024 I got a new job and received a significant pay bump ($21/hr to $31/hr) and I did not know that I was supposed to report my new income to Covered California.
In December 2024 after my surgery (to deal with the aforementioned medical issue) I contacted Covered California about renewing for 2025 and during that conversation I found out that I was supposed to report my income change. That led to my rate increasing to $294/month and the worker told me that I will also be facing a tax penalty and backpay for not letting them know about my new monthly income.
When I prepared my taxes a few days ago she revealed that the backpay was a total of $1,100 and she said that she's seen this with a lot of her clients and even herself. She stated that with my line of work I will most likely earn more than I anticipate this year and will most likely pay even more taxes to the IRS with Covered California. She urged me to get on a new health insurance plan asap. My current options are to contact the company that I work with (it's a third party company that I get pay from as a contractor even though I work full time hours). OR I can contact individual insurance companies and try to just get a rate directly with them.
My questions are
1) Am I even able to switch my insurance this late into the year? I don't have a major qualifying event aside from just wanting to leave Covered California.
2) Are the options that I mentioned above correct or are there other solutions that I am not aware of?
submitted by /u/brown-bear-cuddles
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