CrowdHealth

Crowdfunding Cheap Health Insurance in Georgia: Non-Insurance Plans for Coverage Through CrowdHealth

All patients deserve to receive the care they need whenever they go to the doctor, and health insurance is supposed to make it affordable. Unfortunately, Georgia health insurance is often expensive, complicated, and limiting. Monthly premiums are often exorbitant, breaking your budget even if you don’t have a health emergency. Most plans also have deductibles and co-payments that force you to pay a fortune before your plan provides any coverage. Worst of all, health insurance companies are fond of telling people which doctors they can see even though they have no idea what the average Georgian’s healthcare needs are. They even have the gall to cite these “networks” as insurance benefits.

If you want to enroll in a new insurance plan, you generally have a limited time frame to do so without penalty. Your employer might offer several medical plans that change every year, or you might compare relatively low-cost health insurance options on a public marketplace. Programs such as Medicaid and Medicare are supposed to be more affordable, but their monthly premiums and limited coverage can still prove onerous.

There are so many problems with health insurance that you probably won’t find the coverage you need at an affordable price within the traditional system. Fortunately, a company called CrowdHealth is disrupting the insurance industry through crowdfunded health plans with no monthly premiums, deductibles, physician networks, or profits-before-people attitudes. We’re not traditional insurance — rather, our plans are about helping people get the care they need without breaking the bank. Please continue reading to learn more about our plans, the complimentary resources they include, and how we hope to upend the current health insurance paradigm one Member at a time!=

How much do health insurance plans cost in Georgia?

The cost of Georgia health insurance depends on several different factors such as an individual’s age, tobacco use, preexisting medical conditions, and whether they are looking for individual or family coverage. The average monthly premium for an individual in Georgia is $394 — not exactly chump change.

Of course, the actual cost of health insurance cannot be calculated through premiums alone. The average 30-something American male in good health has a $4,500 deductible on his policy, meaning that he’s expected to pay thousands of dollars before his coverage kicks in. Many plans have higher deductibles, and they reset every year to make care anything but affordable. Co-pays also make medical insurance costly even if the deductible’s been met. Did we mention that relatively few plans significantly help with out-of-control prescription drug costs?

How does crowdfunding coverage work in Georgia?

When most people hear the word crowdfunding, they think of entrepreneurs selling products on Kickstarter or charitable causes fundraising on GoFundMe. Health insurance isn’t something that can be sold on Kickstarter and most GoFundMe campaigns fail to reach their goals, so you may be wondering how insurance can be reliably crowdfunded. Here is the answer in three easy steps:

1. Contribute to the plan

All CrowdHealth Members pledge to make a monthly contribution to the services we provide. Unlike the monthly premiums that insurance companies charge, CrowdHealth only keeps $30 of every payment to help cover administrative costs. The rest of your payment is stored in a savings account that you can use to pay for care throughout the state and beyond.

This is one of the biggest differences between CrowdHealth and standard insurance. Money in your account remains yours, and you will receive a full refund minus a small closing fee if you decide to cancel CrowdHealth. You can also use funds in your account to pay for the healthcare needs of other Members at your discretion. Making contributions to others will improve your “generosity score”, a numeric indication of how often you’ve helped the Community since joining CrowdHealth. Should you ever have a health emergency, your score will be shown with your funding request. Many Members are more likely to contribute to requests backed by high generosity scores, but it isn’t mandatory to receive funding.

2. Visit a Georgia physician

CrowdHealth doesn’t have any networks, so you can choose any doctor or provider you like in the state. When you do, ask for the cash price of your visit. Doctors don’t always publish cash rates for their services, but they all have them. Many physicians prefer to be paid in cash because it spares them the expenses associated with filing health insurance claims, stressing over prior authorizations, and waiting up to 120 days to receive compensation for their services. CrowdHealth leverages that preference to negotiate more affordable rates, bringing many medical bills down by up to 66% of an initial quote. If you know you’ll be receiving costly care, we ask that you let us know beforehand so our negotiators can work their magic ahead of time. If you need emergency care, we can negotiate after the fact as well.

If your total medical bill comes to $500 or less, you pay it without CrowdHealth’s further involvement. If you owe more than $500, you make a $500 payment and submit a funding request to us for the rest.

3. Submit a claim

While many insurance companies seem to make it as difficult as possible to submit a claim, CrowdHealth makes it easy. Simply download our mobile app through Google Play or the app store, take a photo of all of your medical bills, and click submit. Yes, it’s really that easy.

CrowdHealth facilitates all funding requests, so other Members will see your claim and help pay your bill smoothly and quickly. Better yet, the funds will be transferred directly into your account for ease of access. Most health insurance companies aren’t as quick or convenient as CrowdHealth.

How expensive is crowdfunded Georgia medical insurance?

CrowdHealth bases all pricing on age. Our health plans cost $175 per month for individuals between the ages of 6 and 54, which we call the base rate. If your entire family needs coverage, a group of 4-8 individuals can enroll in our program for $695 per month. If you compare these rates to the typical insurance company, you’ll find that we’re much more affordable.

CrowdHealth plans have no deductible or co-pays beyond the $500 maximum per visit, so you’ll always know what you’re paying. There’s also no limit on how much money you can ask the Community for. Most importantly, our health plans provide the same coverage throughout the state, so your ZIP code or address will not affect your access to this affordable alternative to health insurance.

Are your plans considered health insurance in Georgia?

CrowdHealth doesn’t make the same guarantee that medical bills will be paid that insurance companies do and therefore does not qualify as health insurance in a formal sense. We know that sounds bad, but we think it means that our plans are better than health insurance. Here are three little-known insurance pitfalls and how CrowdHealth health coverage dodges them:

ACA makes affordable health insurance impossible

The Affordable Care Act (also called ACA or simply Obamacare) capped how much money health insurance companies can make at 15 percent of a customer’s monthly premium. That sounds good in theory but encourages insurance companies to raise their premiums in practice. For example, your health insurer is allowed to make a $75 profit if you pay a $500 monthly premium. The only way your health insurer can make more money is to raise your premium. A 10% increase to a $550 premium lets the company make $82.50 per month. Multiply that by 12 months and it’s easy to see why insurance companies are constantly raising premiums.

CrowdHealth doesn’t have premiums at all, so we cannot raise them to become more profitable. Raising our base rate wouldn’t increase our revenues either since we only keep 30 bucks anyway, so it would just make our health plans less accessible. We don’t want to do that.

Payers and providers want the price of health insurance to increase

Many health insurance companies market their plans through the networks of providers they’ve assembled, forcing them to do everything they can to add new ones while maintaining existing relationships. If a provider asks for more money for their services, insurance companies have to oblige to avoid losing them and making their insurance plans less attractive to potential customers. Worse, the health insurer can then use the higher rates to justify premium increases, enriching both insurers and healthcare facilities at the expense of Georgia’s families.

CrowdHealth doesn’t have physician networks, so we’ll never give our Members a raw deal by trying to maintain them. The only way for us to make more money is to find new Members and shop around for more affordable care, both of which also provide benefits to consumers.

The health insurance guarantee is useless

Insurance companies claim that their version of health insurance is a necessity because it guarantees that medical bills will be paid. That would be a significant advantage if insurance plans always delivered on that promise, but they don’t. Nearly 20% of in-network claims were denied by health insurance companies in a 2019 study conducted by the KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation), falling far short of the universal guarantee promised by healthcare plans.

CrowdHealth doesn’t make empty guarantees, but we will say that our health plans have a much higher success rate than the insurance plans in that KFF study. Our Community-based approach to health care is simply more reliable.

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What’s included in this alternative to health insurance in Georgia?

You can ask the CrowdHealth Community for assistance with nearly any bill for over $500, but our plans provide additional benefits too. For example, our discount pharmacy partner can save Members up to 60% on prescription drug costs even if the plan wouldn’t otherwise pay for them. Similarly, all Members receive a dedicated Care Advocate who can negotiate prices on their behalf, provide the necessary resources to make informed health decisions, and deliver an outstanding customer service experience.

All members also receive unlimited access to talk therapy and virtual health visits, and you can get a prescription from a telemedicine visit if you need one. Our health plans are about putting your health first, and we think you’ll see that every time you take advantage of the many benefits we offer.

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Can I provide health coverage to employees in Georgia with a CrowdHealth plan?

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CrowdHealth vs "Affordable" Insurance

CrowdHealth is not insurance. We are a completely new and innovative solution to paying for healthcare. We value community and transparency over profit. Can your insurance company make that claim?