I am currently slogging through the summary of benefits for two plans. Both offered by the same insurance, both silver, same doctor network, etc...
Our current 2018 plan (silver plan A) is going up about $100/month. It also is changing a few things in their favor like the OOP is going up about $500, the ER/outpatient fee is moving from a flat $300 to a percentage (20%), and a few other very minor things that don't bother me (the two I mentioned do bother me, but I keep telling myself that it is unlikely I'll need to worry about either one of them).
I noticed the insurance company offers silver plan B as well. It has the exact same coverage - I went over the summary of benefits for plan A & B side by side, line per line, and there was not one thing different other than one line in the drugs column: "Pharmacy deductible does not apply." But plan B is $60/month cheaper than plan A... and for the life of me I can't figure out why. Generic drugs are 100% covered with no deductible needed and we're not currently on anything that could count towards a deductible anyway.
Coverage is for two adults, mid 40s. No health issues, I am on a low maintenance dose of a thyroid med that is so generic, I don't even bother running it through insurance because it costs me like $10 for 90 day supply. We go to the doctor one time a year for our preventive screenings (I go twice for a well woman/general health checkup) and we get flu shots and boosters and such at the pharmacy each year. We're surprisingly healthy.
I also am debating currently with the idea of stepping down to a bronze level due to the lack of health issues, but we get great subsidies and cost sharing so the silver plan is a REALLY good deal and we only pay like $180-190/month... but I could drop to bronze and get coverage for zero a month (literally pay nothing and have bronze level coverage due to the subsidy) and it would come with a $15K OOP. Which we can easily cover ourselves. Just wondering if it's a smart idea since we're gambling on whether we'll save money or not considering it's kind of random if one of us gets injured or sick enough to blow through that OOP. We may be in great health now, but just a few years ago we both had major health issues, so wondering if that's penny wise/pound foolish to go down to bronze?
Tried talking through all of this with the husband but he's not good with stuff like this and gets a deer in the headlights look. Sigh.