We have not had dental insurance since we worked at Enterprise Rent A Car. Two years ago, we paid nearly $5000 for my husband to have a bridge replaced. We paid for it over a 12 month period (interest-free, thankfully), but it still sucked. Earlier this year, when I got promoted at the library, one of my options was dental coverage. The policy is $110/month, but my portion is only $58/month (for both of us together) – the library pays the rest. We decided that we better go ahead and sign up, since dental insurance for self-employed people is pretty poor. That was Feb 1, so I’ve paid for three months now – about $175. My husband went to the dentist for a cleaning this week. They cleaned his teeth, and also found three old fillings that need to be redone. He had been told about these fillings long ago, but since they weren’t an emergency, and since we would have had to pay for them ourselves, he had forgotten all about it. The dentist showed him the price breakdown: Total charges to fix all three problems: $704. Total cost to us, once insurance readjusts price and pays their portion: $132. That is awesome. And the cleaning was free, so there’s another $100 worth of benefits. When I go in to get my cleaning later this month, it will save us another $100 (probably more, since I haven’t been to a dentist in 4 years, so they’re going to want to do new x-rays, which are also covered on the new policy). So for the whole year, we’re going to pay about $700 for the policy, and in three months, we’re saving close to $800. And if something else comes up, it’s reassuring to know that we’re covered. The policy has a $1000 cap per year (which is pretty common), so if my hubby needs another bridge replaced, it would still suck. But it’s still nice to know that at least we have a dental policy in place to cover most things that may go wrong with our biters.
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