In short, they are ridiculous. Parent of student starting final year here.
Many colleges today require medical insurance and even bill you to buy their policy unless you specifically request a waiver and show some proof of coverage.
I have 2 kids at 2 major northeast private schools, and while they both have a similar policy, there are major differences.
Both offer very good policies, with low deductibles, minimal copay/coinsirance but …
Cornell’s plan is more than DOUBLE the cost compared to my other kid’s college.
Cornell takes 100% upfront payment for academic year, other school bills for each semester.
Yes I am comparing properly, full year cost of each. Bill for fall at one school is 1/4 of what Cornell is billing me, due to both of above issues.
Waiver reasons are simple at other college, prove you have coverage and assert it covers the geographic area.
Cornell has a whole list of very specific details for coverage that are ridiculous. Very easy for them to deny waiver for almost any plan you may have, even if you have very expensive family coverage.
Have younger kids in HS still, you need to keep your family coverage so the Cornell policy is redundant, extra cost, not an alternative.
Switch mid year from your own to cornell’s and lose the benefit of your family deductible helping your student.
My son’s main internist/family doc is out of network on Cornell plan.
I raise this now, since last 3 years Cornell did not enforce their rules, they are trying to do so now.
Be prepared for an extra $2800 unnecessary expense, if your child already has good coverage.
Now if you do not have a good policy, this plan is pretty good, but way more expensive than other college plans, and you have no choice. They try to justify it as a platinum plan, but again, my other child’s college offers identical coverage at < 1/2 the price in the same geographical area. Cornell is being financially irresponsible and inconsiderate as it pertains to this plan and policies on it’s requirement. Budget for this folks, and consider this when applyng for financial aid.
I agree. They added new requirements this year. I just wrote to ask for an appeal. I had to do this our first year. Our plan participates in a Shared Savings Program. Reason we were denied was because of Cayuga. So we are hoping.
I feel fortunate. I submitted a waiver this past Saturday evening and on Monday morning, I got an email saying it was accepted. I have a pretty vanilla health plan through my company. I have yet to get a waiver reply from my other daughter’s school.
My son was on the Cornell plan for the past two years and I thought the level of coverage and network were both excellent. I wish my younger son’s university offered anything similar, but instead their plan only includes coverage for providers within the area immediately around their campus…and charges only $400 less per year than Cornell SHIP.
My son used the plan for an emergency room visit in Ithaca and to see a specialist in Manhattan, and the coverage was excellent for both. I added the dental plan his second year and my son received far more in benefits than the cost of the annual premium.
@nmcorm Yes Cornell (their agent) makes a fast decision. They have for the last 4 years for my son. The problem is they granted the waiver for 3 years now denied despite having the exact same policy. Arbitrary enforcement of arbitrary rules. Yes my other child’s school is slower, minimal admin staff likely the reason, but they leave an important decision to the parents/student by having minimal waiver rules.
@CT1417 The plan is very high end coverage, in terms of deductibles and % covered no doubt. That alone is not an isssue for me. My other son though has a nearly identical plan (except better in network coverage back home compared to Cornell shp. And his policy is $1300/year vs $2800 for Cornell.
My main issue is not with the plan itself, but the cost and also the fact that they are forcing it on you despite having a good plan that a responsible parent is happy with. Health insurance can be purchased for a family or as an individual, who are they to tell me my family plan is not sufficient ? This forces me to either keep a family policy for other kids (doubling my insurance cost) or remove my family and buy separate policies for each kid, not just at Cornell. They have to know this is a highly impactful decision, and they do not seem to care. In fact my coverage is excellent and economical, but they dont agree and overule a parent ?
This policy was meant to help students without sufficient coverage. International student do not have US coverage.
Some US students may have little or no coverage (and they may be on finaid). But for those of us in the US with national family coverage, this is judgment call, and apparently theirs not yours.
My D submitted a waiver application around 2 pm today. At 4:17 pm, Cornell emailed back saying it’s approved. I have the same insurance policy as last year’s.
Past years they were fairly quick to approve the waiver (2-3 days max) but I had waited over 2 weeks for their agent (AJ Gallagher) to decide on an appeal (exception). AJG was not responding to calls/emails to get some ETA, so I went to Cornell Student Benefits directly, and they resolved the issue in a couple of days. Got my waiver.
For any new students/parents, there is a unique issue at Cornell. They have one big hospital in Ithaca, and that hospital knows they have a monopoly, made a deal with Cornell and their health insurance provider, but are often out of network for other major healthcare providers. I have the largest national healthcare provider with a huge network and this is one of the only major hospitals not covered. Just about every doctor and hospital we have ever considered utilizing was in-network for my existing plan (and we live in NY so this is not an issue of being in a different region).
The issue here is mainly Cayuga health center and their lack of desire to accept most insurance plans.
That said, the crux of my argument, was that my plan has a max-out-of-pocket amount and that Cayuga, even if out of network, could only cost us so much (and only a bit more than the insurance premium). I have another son at school in another city in upstate NY, and he school is very quick to give the waiver, there is no issue with our policy covering the major hospitals near his campus.
Note the on campus healthcare is excellent, and basic services are provided with a nominal annual fee that we all must pay. I have no issue with that fee, the on campus health center is FANTASTIC, and I am glad to contribute to it’s success. But when something is not covered on or off campus and you need insurance, the $2800 expense is only needed if you don’t have a good policy for your family. Likely Cornell’s policy IS better for your kid alone when in Ithaca, but when you consider you still need coverage for siblings, and coverage at home during summer/winter breaks, it turned out to be worse for us.
@blevine, I’m in the same situation as you. We are NY residents with a Gold level family plan, but it looks like we don’t qualify for a waiver either bc Cayuga Medical Center is not a participating provider on our plan. I bought the Cornell plan last year and the one and only time my child needed medical attention, Gannett was closed and she had to go the ER, which was covered under my original insurance anyway. I haven’t even tried to submit a waiver, but maybe I should give it a go just in case their reimbursement rates meet Cornell’s standards (although I think I may have the same health insurance company as you based on what you said, so it’s not looking likely).
@blevine I just looked up Boston College and it is $3,000 per year for health coverage. I can’t submit the waiver without their address and dorm notification is Aug 1st! I hope the waivers go through - twins!
Health insurance is a state issue. What is required to be covered is a state matter (other than the ACA requirements) and the premiums are also approved state by state.
I also had two kids at schools in different states. Both were easy to waive the insurance but just opting out. For one kid, we did opt out because she was about 40 minutes away from medical care under my plan, but the other one we paid the $1800 or so for coverage because she played a sport and I was afraid of an injury. The only thing she ever used it for were birth control pills and several flu/strep tests.
I’m not surprised by health insurance being a state level issue. I have two daughters in NY universities and a third at a Michigan university. The two NY daughters both need medical insurance at their schools, with the school plans offered at roughly the same cost. The one daughter at a Michigan school has no health insurance requirement at all - they offer it, but there’s no requirement to have any. So far so good on the waivers. I hope that lasts for all 4 years…
@patatty Their main issue is Cayuga being out-of-network and that out-of-net coverage must be 70%
But per the website above
“We recognize that in some of these cases, the denial comes as a surprise. In response,we are approving waivers for individuals with at least 50% coverage at Cayuga Medical Center.”
I had 60% so they accepted this upon appeal.
@twoinanddone I don’t know where you get that this is a state issue. Please cite your source.
This is PRIVATE insurance sold to you buy a PRIVATE university.
The state mandates some immunizations and AFAIK that is it.
And if it was a state issue, why is my son at another upstate NY private college being quoted $1300 ?
Is one school subject to these state rates and another not ? I don’t think so.
The issue is that Ithaca is an expensive oasis in what is otherwise a low cost rural area.
Everything costs more there, apartments, and Cayuga.
My other son is near a major upstate NY city and hotels to visit him cost half of Ithaca,
as does the health insurance with otherwise same coverage as Cornell.
Both rent a few blocks off campus, but in Ithaca the rent is almost double in the other city,
for a similar size apartment. But it is not a nice city compared to Ithaca
@3sonsmom I feel for you, I attended Boston U many years ago. Unlike upstate NY, everything in Boston area is very expensive and I am not surprised. But then again, you do have some of the best doctors and hospitals in the world in Boston, so at least you are getting premium healthcare for your $. But in Ithaca you are getting upstate NY at Boston/NYC prices, for everything.
Folks, whatever you think you may spend on Cornell, it will be more than other private colleges in rural areas.
Just be prepared, but I agree, no worse than cost of BC, BU, NYU etc. And much prettier too ! I love Ithaca,
but then again I love Boston and NYC, and all are expensive ! I guess you get what you pay for.
But for some families this insurance may or may not be one of the expenses you need to pay.
Look carefully at the plan you have and decide.
This health insurance thing is making us nuts. We have 100% coverage for emergency rooms and 100% coverage for local docs with pre-approval. Waiver denied . Multiple calls, documents sent, emails. Our insurance company is bending over backwards to help us within the limits of what their lawyers will allow them to write. Cornell is looking for specific language and it’s not “70%” coverage, you are SOL. It’s ridiculous to be forced to by redundant health insurance we are not going to use.
All insurance is approved and governed by the state department of insurance.
Even if a policy is approved by the state, it may not have enough coverage in an area to allow a school to accept it. For example, Kaiser is a big insurer in California, policies are approved by the state, etc. But UC-Santa Barbara won’t accept it as coverage for the students because there is no Kaiser provider within 40 miles so UCSB requires the student to buy another policy. A family could have one child at UCSB, not covered, but another student at Davis fully covered under the family policy, and the family might live in LA, closer to the child who is deemed to have no coverage.
Someone could have one child at Cornell and have that child be required to buy the university policy and another at Brown with coverage under the family policy being deemed good enough, even if the family lives in NY.
@UglyMom Yes a waiver was approved based on revised standards that Cornell publised on a link I provided above.
They indicated “for one year only”, which has always been the case, this is an annual review process. But they implied it would be enforced more next year.
@twoinanddone Insurance firms are regulated by states to allow or prevent policies being sold, to ensure they are able to meet financial obligations. But that is a huge reach to say they set pricing as you indicated, they do not in most states for most types of private insurance. I live in NY, both my sons go to school in NY. All have approval for sale in NYS with vastly different coverage and costs. Difference in coverage between mine employer coverage and the schools are substantial, but my policy is and always was a major NYS carrier. There are local docs near both schools, but yes coverage is worse in-network in ithaca than near more major cities. But iut of network coverage is there, with full in-network for emergencies.
As a parent of a kid heading back for 4th year in Ithaca, and another kid for 3rd year not far away, both kids almost never went for medical care near school. For urgent/emergency care we have coverage in-network in, and for non emergency they tend to go for checkups during summer and winter breaks at home. Kids are busy and wont go for a checkup during semester. My policy is fine for our needs, and Cornell nor NYS should be telling us differently. The details of need and each policy are too unique to have their small staff make fair evaluations.
But it is Cornell that gets to set the rules. You can claim they are stupid, as you did in your original post, but it’s not the CC community you need to convince.
Of course the coverage of insurance and the premiums are approved by the states where they are marketed. That’s what the department of insurance does. You, as a NY resident, can’t decide you like the health insurance policy of Missouri better and buy that one. That was one of the big arguments in the last election, portability of insurance or shopping across state lines.
My kids went to schools that allowed us to waive the school’s policy without submitting our policy for review, or even having insurance at all. It was our choice whether to pay for the extra coverage. For one kid I paid, for the other I did not. The one I paid for was an athlete and I was using it as true insurance - in case of a catastrophe, I wanted her to have insurance. In the end we paid several thousand dollars for a few strep tests and two cases of the flu (and there was a co-pay with those). It definitely would have been cheaper to just pay for the strep tests OOP, but that’s what insurance is - paying for coverage you hope never to use.
@twoinanddone Premiums are approved but NOT SET by the state.
Cornell is charging 2800 (really 2400 if you consider the separate health fee).
Our other local private school is charging $1300/year for an almost identical plan.
So yes, NYS approved both, but Cornell should not offer only the most expensive option and then force students to buy it. I suspect this is related to Cayuga being unwilling to work with other insurance firms, so the rates may not be Cornell’s fault, but forcing people to buy it certainly is.
And if enough people push back, yes Cornell will have to listen.
If all just pay it without asserting their needs, then yes they hold all the cards.
Cornell is getting tough, parents/students need to get tough.
College students are not there to have others think for them.
AJG indicated the matter could not be escalated further, then admitted they do have an appeal process, yet they did not make a decision nor respond with a timeframe. So despite their “advice” I contacted Student Benefits anyway and laid out my case. I must not be the only one, since they updated the site indicating a relaxing of the rules.
Seems one of your colleges may have been too lenient, granting waiver with no proof of insurance. But this was the opposite exteme. Our other college just set the bar perfectly. You submit proof, they warn you to check local coverage, grant you the waiver, and leave open the option to buy a much cheaper excellent policy if things change (losing your other coverage). That is a school looking out for their students. The Cornell policy is overreach. One of the differences attending a large vs smaller achool.
As far as you personally buying a policy, that is not the issue, having the option to do so is fantastic, glad you found it useful. That does not mean it should be forced on all.
@blevine Went directly to Cornell Health and was given a very compassionate “no”. It seems they are bending a bit for existing students. Many waivers approved last year were not approved this year and parents are not happy. Cornell is working with them, but for new students, you get the new policy.
