Con Watch: Medicare Open Enrollment Scams

Steve Weisman is a lawyer, college professor, author, and one of the country’s leading experts in cybersecurity, identity theft, and scams. See Steve’s other Con Watch articles.

The annual open enrollment period for Medicare this year runs October 15 – December 7. This is the only time during the year that people enrolled in Medicare can change their Medicare health plans, Medigap plans, and prescription drug plans. By now, people already enrolled in Medicare should have received a Plan Annual Notice of Change from their health insurance providers describing any changes to their plans, such as dropping particular drugs from their prescription drug plan, changes in premiums, or changes in co-pays.

Scammers and identity thieves view the open enrollment period as senior citizen hunting season, so Medicare scams are common during this time. Some of the scams include:

• Seniors may be contacted by someone purporting to be from their insurance company asking them to verify information. This is a common tactic of identity thieves trying to trick their victims into providing information that will be used for identity theft.
• They also may be contacted by people claiming to have supplemental insurance programs that will save them thousands of dollars. Here too, you cannot be sure that they are legitimate regardless of the contact method.
• Scammers send phishing emails that appear to come from your employer asking you to review and approve your health care benefit and then lure you into clicking on malware-infected links or providing personal information that can lead to identity theft.
• Crooks posing as Medicare agents might tell you that you need a new Medicare card and to do so you need to provide them with your Social Security number. The truth is that there are no new Medicare cards being issued and Medicare never asks for your Social Security number.
• Some scammers actually come to your home claiming that they are Medicare representatives offering gifts for enrolling in plans they provide. This scam is easily avoided by recognizing that Medicare never sends representatives to your home.

How to Avoid Being Scammed

Never give personal information to anyone who calls you on the phone because you can never be sure who is actually on the other end of the line. Similarly, Medicare will not initiate communication with you by text or email in which they ask for personal information, so anytime you receive such a communication it is a scam.

If you want to get information you can trust about what insurance plans are available to you and at what cost, go to Medicare’s website. If you want to speak with someone on the phone, call Medicare on its 24-hour hotline 1-800-MEDICARE. Medicare options can be quite confusing. Fortunately, the State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP), which is a national network of federally funded programs, provides free Medicare counseling.