Medicare open enrollment commenced last month. This gives Medicare beneficiaries an opportunity to review their Medicare supplement insurance plans and possibly make changes to their current Medicare coverage. Therefore, if you are enrolled in Medicare this is the time to determine if you are satisfied with your current plan and to compare your current coverage to other options that may be available.
However, given the higher volume of advertisements and commercials related to Medicare, Medicare open enrollment presents an opportunity for scammers to prey on the elderly for ID theft and Medicare fraud.
Just like the IRS, Medicare will not call the beneficiaries to request any information or payment. Should you receive any calls in that nature, we recommend hanging up immediately.
It is important to remember that Medicare will not ask for your Medicare card information. Therefore, we recommend declining to providing that information unless you have verified that you are talking to a medical care provider.
Safeguarding your Medicare card information is important because one of the more common scams involve scammers using a Medicare number that was accessed under false pretenses to fraudulently make reimbursement claims on the victim’s account.
With Medicare open enrollment in full swing, we recommend extra caution during this time to avoid any scams and to also monitor your benefits for any fraudulent charges.