If your coverage is not subsidized: Ways to buy health plans.  (Whether or not receiving benefits subsidized by HPInc or HPE.)

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Based on reports from HP Alumni Association members who have completed enrollment. Join forums: https://www.hpalumni.org  Not officially endorsed or supported. Question? Email us: info@hpalumni.org  (Updated Dec 2, 2025)  

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HPInc. No private group Medicare plans will be offered by HPInc. Instead, for certain HP and DEC retirees HPInc is offering a special Retiree Reimbursement Account to subsidize open-market individual Medicare plans -- as well as general dental, vision, and/or hearing plans -- if they are bought from one specific nationwide insurance sales agency, Alight Retiree Health Solutions. AlightRHS carries Medicare plans from many, but not all, major insurers.

With effort on your part, it is possible to be reimbursed for plans purchased via another channel. https://www.hpalumni.org/enroll-without-alightrhs

You may wish to buy your Advantage or Medigap plan via another path and use the HPInc RRA subsidy to buy other plans from AlightRHS  -- such as Medicare Drug  -- or general dental or vision. Details on RRAs: https://www.hpalumni.org/enroll-rra-process

HPE. No U.S. group plans -- Medicare or otherwise -- will be offered by HPE. Instead, you need to transition to publicly-available individual plans. To assist with the transition, HPE is referring retirees to a nationwide insurance sales agency, Alight Retiree Health Solutions. AlightRHS carries Medicare plans from many, but not all, major insurers..

"For retirees and covered family members (and surviving spouses) with a mix of Medicare eligibility, Alight can help you choose from insurance options available in the federal marketplace, or if you live where state-based marketplaces exist, such as in California [i.e. Covered California], they can help refer you to local options... Then, when you reach Medicare age, Alight can continue supporting your coverage needs." [State Exchange Directory on the official Medicare site.]

If your coverage is not subsidized, there are many ways to select and buy health policies -- aside from the AlightRHS sales agency:

- National sales agencies (such as AlightRHS) offer some of the policies available in your county.

- Some insurers (such as Mutual of Omaha or Regence) sell direct.

- Some insurers and health systems (such as Kaiser or Harvard Pilgrim) sell direct. Some have preferred sales agencies -- such as Sutter with Alignment Health.

- A local independent agent may be more familiar with what works best in your area -- and be more experienced in constructing applications that get approved.

To compensate for local cost variations, government payments -- and policy prices -- vary by county, as determined by zip code.

Insurers may elect to drop coverage in some counties and use loss-leader pricing to gain long-term market share in other areas.

For a specific plan under the same terms, you pay the same price regardless of who you bought it from.

Once an application is approved by an insurer, the sales agency is paid an initial commission -- and continuing commissions every year for servicing your account. Advantage: $700-$860 for initial sale; $350-$430 for each year thereafter. Medigap: typically $260-$440 (22%) initial year and each year for five more years. Part D: $114, then $57/year.

Not all policies are available from AlightRHS. No sales agency -- including AlightRHS -- offers all policies available in your county. (For example, Harvard Pilgrim is only available direct. However, Tufts is available through Alight, per the HPInc Enrollment Guide.)

To see all policies available in your county from any source, go to the official US Government site. Some are small local or regional plans. The plan names indicate that some are for veterans or other specific groups. Some plans prefer to sell direct or through a single agency. https://www.medicare.gov/plan-compare  (Non-Medicare: https://www.healthcare.gov )

If you have a problem with a plan. As with any insurance sales agency... start with the agency that sold you the plan. For Alight Retiree Health Solutions, if the first-level person can't resolve your issue, they can escalate it to a special group within Alight. The sales agency gets a monthly commission for servicing your account. (HPInc or HPE is out of the picture, except for reimbursing you from your RRA.)

Next step: Menu of key Enrollment issues: https://www.hpalumni.org/enroll-menu

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