Also called the Annual Election Period, the Medicare Fall OEP came about with the introduction of Medicare Part D in 2006. It is an 8-week period every fall during which Medicare beneficiaries can enroll in, change, or disenroll from their Medicare Advantage and/or Part D drug plans.
Here’s why the period exists: Part D plans and Medicare Advantage plans get to re-file their benefits with Medicare each year.
This means the benefits and premiums on your plan can change or go up. So Medicare lets you have an election period each year to change your plan if you don’t like the changes to your existing coverage.
In short: your Part D benefits change every year, so you get an election period to change your plan if you don’t like those benefit changes.
Now, the good news is that you do NOT have to change your plan if you like your plan. In fact, statistics show that the majority of beneficiaries do NOT make changes to their plan each year. However, you absolutely should be reviewing the upcoming plan changes every fall.
How Do I Know if I Need to Make Changes to my Plan?
The date you can make changes to your plan is October 15th to December 7th.
Your Medicare Advantage or Part D Insurance plan provider will send you a document in September called the Annual Notice of Change. Take 15 minutes to sit down and review this document. It will tell you if the premium is changing, and also if your copays, drug formulary or pharmacy networks are changing.
The Annual Notice of Change lists the plan’s changes side-by-side from 2022 to 2023. This makes it easy to compare changes to coverage.
What Changes Can I Make During Medicare Open Enrollment 2023?
Your choices for plan changes during the Medicare OEP?
Do nothing and your current Medicare coverage will automatically renew in 2023
Enroll in, leave, or change your Medicare Part D drug plan
Switch from Traditional Medicare to a Medicare Advantage plan
Switch from a Medicare Advantage plan back to Traditional Medicare
Change from one Medicare Advantage Plan to another
Keep in mind that Part D drug plans have no health questions. You can change to any other plan as long as you have either Medicare A and/or B and you live in the plan’s service area.