Definitions

HICAP- The Health Insurance Counseling and Advocacy Program, volunteers that help provide assistance with Medicare and other health insurance for seniors.

CALIFORNIA PARTNERSHIP- An alliance between the State of California and private long term care insurance companies.  The program is designed to allow people to protect personal assets equal to the amount of coverage purchased under the Partnership plan.

DAILY BENEFITS- The amount of coverage you buy that the insurance company will reimburse.

LENGTH OF BENEFITS. Time period of coverage ranging from one year of coverage to lifetime protection. The coverage time begins when you trigger benefits. Lifetime protection benefits never run out,

ACTIVITIES OF DAILY LIVING-  ADL's are what determine if you qualify for benefits.  They are: ambulating, bathing, continence, dressing, toileting, and transferring. Cognitive impairment is also covered

INFLATION PROTECTION- it protects your daily benefit, usually companies have a 5% simple or 5% compound inflation factor or a CPI index factor built in.

WAIVER OF PREMIUM- Once benefits are paid, some companies waive the insurance premiums on their care. Almost all do that on nursing home, only some an home health care.

BED RESERVATION BENEFITS- Insurance companies will continue to pay for nursing home beds while the individual has been hospitalized or on vacation up to a certain number of days.

ELIMINATION PERIOD- The time period that you are responsible for payment for long term care before the insurance starts to pay, Do not be fooled into thinking you automatically got 100 days of coverage from your insurance. The mistake could cost you a lot of money.

SURVIVORSHIP BENEFITS- If married, and you keep the coverage a certain length of time and one spouse dies, the premium on the surviving spouse is paid up in full.

NON-FORFEITURE BENEFITS- If you elect to pay a higher premium, A protects the amount of money you have paid in premiums and it is used toward benefits, Ex. If you paid $2,000 per year for 20 years and then cancelled your policy, you have $2,000 x2O = $40,000 in benefits coming to you.

RETURN OF PREMIUM- If you pay substantially more (usually about 36%) more in premiums, then you can get a large portion of your money back if you keep your policy a certain length of time.