What is a Vision Care Plan?
The cost of routine eye exams and prescription eyewear can be of real concern, especially for large families. In many cases, a Vision Care Plan can lower these annual expenses.
A Vision Care Plan is not the same as health insurance. Regular health insurance plans protect you against financial losses due to unexpected eye injuries or disease. A Vision Care Plan, on the other hand, is a wellness benefit designed to provide routine eye care, prescription eyewear and other vision-related services at a reduced cost.
Where can I get a Vision Care Plan?
While most people obtain Vision Care Plans through their employers, it is also possible to purchase a Vision Care Plan as an individual. It is also important to compare features and benefits of plans considered as costs can vary significantly. Lower priced plans may have limited options on providers and materials offered.
Is there a difference between plans?
Vision Care Plans may be included as a value-added benefit to some indemnity health insurance plans, health maintenance organization (HMO) plans, and plans offered by preferred provider organizations (PPOs). However, one should be aware that this type of benefit is often provided at no additional cost to the policy, and may simply be a ploy to direct consumers into retail eye wear chains that ultimately provides no real value to the patient. As in most things, the old adage "you get what you pay for" applies to these types of plans.
A quality Vision Care Plan should have a large panel of providers made up of independent private practice doctors. There should be a clearly defined benefit for examination, eyeglass frames, eyeglass lenses and / or contact lenses. Copays for these items, if required should be clearly stated. From a consumer standpoint, a good rule of thumb to follow when choosing a Vision Care Plan should be that if there are not plenty of independent private practices to choose from (only large chain optical retailers) then quality of the examination and materials provided should be suspect.
What Vision Care Plans does your office offer?
At Eye Tech, we accept Vision Care Direct, VSP, and Access Eye Med plans. If you are an individual looking for a Vsion Care Plan or an employer looking to provide a quality plan for your employees, we recommend Vision Care Direct. Click here to visit the Vision Care Direct website. Click here to check your VSP benefits.
What about Medical Insurance?
It is important to remember that for patients with medical eye conditions such as glaucoma, macular degeneration, dry eye, eye infections, etc, part of your visit may be covered by medical insurance. Non-covered services by medical plans usually include refraction (checking for the eyeglass prescription) and contact lens services. Please call our office to determine which services may be covered for you.
What are my payment options?
Typically, if a group Vision Care Plan is available from your employer, you pay for it through payroll deductions or flexible spending accounts (FSAs).
An FSA, sometimes called a cafeteria plan, allows an employee to use pre-tax dollars to purchase selected health benefits such as vision insurance. You save money because you receive the full benefit of income that has been set aside for health costs, making it not subject to or reduced by taxation.
If you purchase an individual Vision Care Plan because your employer doesn't offer a group plan (or because you are self-employed), you can expect to be billed monthly or annually.
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