Older adults and long-term care residents could end up with more money in their pockets if the Senate’s bipartisan Beneficiary Enrollment Notification and Eligibility Simplification 2.0 Act becomes law. The result, perhaps, could be that long-term care becomes more affordable for them, or more accessible to more people.
Sens. Bob Casey (D-PA), Todd Young (R-IN) and others introduced the act; it builds on the original BENES Act passed in December 2020, which eliminated “needless” coverage gaps for new Medicare beneficiaries. The newest version of the act, referred to as BENES 2.0, the senators said, will help older adults and people with disabilities by requiring advance notice of eligibility to help individuals avoid costly late enrollment penalties.
In addition to Casey and Young, the Bipartisan BENES 2.0 Act is co-sponsored by Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Susan Collins (R-ME), Tim Scott (R-SC), Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), and Tina Smith (D-MN) and Debbie Stabenow (D-MI).
Casey said that 10,000 baby boomers are aging into Medicare each day. Young pointed out that older adults who miss the sign-up deadline for Medicare Part B face penalties that persist for the rest of their lives. He added that the legislation would fill a long-standing gap
in education for older adults and people with disabilities.
“Medicare is one of America’s greatest success stories, but we need to make sure people can make the most of the Medicare benefits they have earned,” Casey said in a news release. “That’s why I introduced the bipartisan BENES 2.0 Act, to ensure that fewer people miss the deadline to enroll, which can lead to costly lifelong penalties.”
According to the Congressional Research Service, in 2020, approximately 776,000 people with Medicare were paying a Part B late enrollment penalty, and the average late enrollment penalty amounted to an increase of almost 27% in a beneficiary’s monthly premium.
