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HOW TO ENROLL IN MEDICARE

Enrollment

Medicare is part of Social Security. In general, you must be 65 or older to enroll in Medicare, so if you took early retirement, you generally must wait until you are 65 to get Medicare. If you are under 65, you may qualify if you are on disability or dialysis. See the link below to determine your eligibility.

To enroll in Medicare, you have 2 options:

Call Social Security toll-free at 800-772-1213. (TTY users call 800-325-0778).
Visit a local Social Security office. To locate one near you, click here.

Eligibility and Early/Late Retirement

In general, you are only eligible for Medicare when you turn 65 (earlier if you meet certain medical conditions. See link below). Even if you are not eligible for Social Security until age 66 or later, you can still get Medicare at age 65.

By this same token, you may be eligible for Social Security but not for Medicare. For example, if you take early retirement and begin receiving Social Security before age 65, you probably won’t be eligible for Medicare until you turn 65. So make sure you have health insurance coverage until then!

By the same token, if you are still working full time past age 65 and are covered by a qualified employer or union health plan, you may not need to enroll in Medicare until you actually retire (although most health plans require employess to go on Medicare at age 65 and use the company or union plan as a supplemental).

That is, you can apply for Social Security at 65 regardless of your work status. When you do, you are automatically enrolled in Medicare Part A (which is free for most people). However, if your work health plan provides for major medical and prescription drug coverage, there may be no reason for you to get this coverage through Medicare until you actually retire (or unless the plan requires it).

But remember that, whether you retire at 65 or later, when you do retire you have only 63 days to apply for Medicare if you want to avoid paying a penalty on your premiums.

The Medicare website let’s you check your eligibility, although the actual enrollment is through Social Security. To see if you are eligible, you can click here for the Medicare Eligibility website

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