Medicare Now Providing For Paying Premium Online With Credit Card

me1004 | Oct 11, 2019 | 1,381 posts since 2010

Medicare is now finally accepting payment online using a credit card, and no fee for doing so. Until now, if you wanted to pay with your credit card, you had to mail in the payment voucher with the payment information.

You go to mymedicare.gov, create an account if you do not already have one, and then click on Pay My Premium.

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CuriousDave | Oct 17, 2019 | 233 posts since 2018

For those who chose to have their premiums automatically deducted from their Social Security benefits, this option is not available. It is available only for those who already are (or will be) directly billed by Medicare.

alan1 | Oct 17, 2019 | 880 posts since 2015

Curious Dave -- Please elaborate. I thought that people who are collecting Social Security and are enrolled in Medicare Part B don't get to _choose_ to have the Medicare Part B premium deducted from their Social Security payment. The Part B premium is automatically deducted -- it's not the Part B recipient's choice. How can one go about collecting Social Security benefits and being enrolled in Medicare Part B without having the Medicare premium automatically deducted? How can recipients exercise the choice that you say they have? Thank you.

Kaight | Oct 23, 2019 | 1,192 posts since 2011

Thank you for your post, alan1. I agree with you very strongly. It would be wonderful to be able to pay Medicare with a rewards CC. But, like yourself, I always thought Social Security recipients do not get to choose how we pay. CuriousDave has not answered you. I surely wish he would answer. A lot of money is riding on this.

Kaight | Oct 23, 2019 | 1,192 posts since 2011

OK, alan1, I have the answer and it will come as no surprise to you. I just completed a chat session over at medicare.gov where I put the key question. The response was nearly instantaneous. We CANNOT pay using a CC. There is no option except to have our payments deducted from our SS. Period. Hence, the CC payment option mentioned above by CuriousDave is worthless if you are on Social Security.

Seems to me this is yet another argument, if one can afford to do so, for delaying signing up for Social Security. Between this and the IRMAA it seems to me delaying for as long as possible makes a LOT of sense, again if you can afford it. This latest incoming fire is so unfair to SS recipients. Why not just shoot us and get it over with?

BTW I have an analogous problem with my medical bills. They are sent by my medical services provider straight away to Medicare. I am not billed and have no option to use my rewards CC to pay those bills . . . . and receive a 2.5% reward in the process! The only bill I receive each year is for my deductible, which I am able to pay with that CC. I do so happily.

me1004 | Oct 24, 2019 | 1,381 posts since 2010

You should be happy they send their bill direct to Medicare, that you can't get it and pay instead. The bill they send to Medicare is for a lot higher price than Medicare actually pays -- but they have no choice but to accept the Medicare amount as full payment, you owe no more. Do you want to pay that higher price, and get the Medicare price back from Medicare?

It's all basically a scam, as how much doctors charge is one of the considerations in setting the Medicare and other prices in the first place. Those higher, fake numbers they send boost the payment in later years.

I'm with Kaiser, and Kaiser says the doctors there are actual employees of Kaiser. Yet, they have them send in their price to Kaiser for anything they do, and then Kaiser pays their lower price instead. Its all just paperwork, but helps to boost the prices Kaiser gets from Medicare.

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