Wondering if anyone else had their health coverage revoked? Even though mine was supposed to run through Oct with my severance? I went to renew my pr-scrip-ion yesterday, and they told me it was no longer valid, I called BCBSM and they said Ford stopped it at the end of May... WTF. Called Ford and they said, yep I should have it, and will contact BCBSM... no date for resolution, no urgency, I just have to wait.
3 replies (most recent on top)
I've worked for myself almost my entire life.
Have I made a ton of money? Nope.
But there are advantages:
#1. You learn quickly that "the money will NOT go on forever" and think 2 or 3 times before purchasing that snazzy boat or the cabin up north just because you can currently afford the monthly payment(s).
#2. No company, anywhere really cares about your future. Shocker right?
They only care about the bottom line and the few powerful stockholders they have to answer to.
#3. If your skills are not unique, you have little to no value to any company - no matter how many years you've collected a bi-weekly paycheck. You can be replaced by a cheap youngster, robot or not at all (in most cases). If the youngster's skills aren't unique either, they'll get canned just before they retire too.
Proof of this are the large numbers of seasoned employees that get dumped just before the pay-for-breathing pensions go into effect. They spent most of their lives working at Ford. Obviously, their usefulness to the company has diminished to less than zero and they are now worth more to the company only if they are excised like a parasitic, cancerous mole.
This makes the term "at will employee" carry a bit of a sting doesn't it? Welcome to my world. Might be high time to negotiate an exit plan while you're busy trying to make an entrance at a new prospective company.
#4. If you've been making a decent living all these years with your skills and knowledge, what's to prevent you from making the same if you were to go on your own? In other words, are your skills and knowledge a valuable — and more importantly — a marketable product to anyone?
This is especially true for those old timers that have morphed their original jobs into some kind of unexplainable and vague title that doesn't mean anything to anyone outside the firm. Something like "Global Design Strategist" doesn't mean much to anyone inside or outside your company and especially to prospective companies so the fancy title can rightfully be laid to rest now too.
#5. The reality is that you've most likely been insulated from the challenges that many of us "entrepreneurs" face monthly, like healthcare costs to name a really big one. On top of that, we don't have access to any "alphabet plan" to discount our costs of automobiles. Ford management leases averaged around $400/month with ZERO down for a spanking new car every few months... and that included insurance. Welcome to my world where you have to purchase a car for that same $400/month, after a few thousand down, and add to that the $150 to $200/month for no-fault insurance. Oh, you want a second car for your spouse? Double all of that and buy your own tires and oil changes. Check the prices for a healthcare plan that covers the same that your plan does at Ford. The monthly premiums alone are enough to give you a heart attack.
The bottom line is that if you really were as essential as you think you were to the company's bottom line, you'd still be there. Unfortunately, that's not the case and if you still believe otherwise, then by all means, band together with the others like you that were laid off and start your own competing car firm. You were paid plenty for your skills and you know how to do the job better than anyone else right? I say, "Go for it!" because what have you got to lose?
Learn to adapt quickly or learn quickly to say; "You want fries with that?"
My insurance was cancelled June 1 as well. I noticed it mid June. You have to call NESC they corrected it within a week. I know of others that this happened to.
I was told the same, that as a part of my severance my coverage would continue through October. I filled a pr-scrip-ion last week and went to the doctor on Tuesday without an issue so my coverage is still in effect.