Decisions, DecisionsIt is 6:00 where I am. At 3:00, I received a phone call from a company I interviewed with at the beginning of this month. It was a job offer. The pay: the beginning of my requested pay scale with full company paid medical and dental, company matched 401K program and retirement fund (if I choose to participate in either). I have until Friday afternoon at 5:00 to confirm the offer and accept the position. At 3:45 (give or take a few minutes), I received another phone call. It was a job offer. The pay: just under the middle of may requested pay scale with 1/2 employee and 1/2 company paid medical. No dental. No 401K program but, they do offer a retirement plan where every 10th dollar is met with the company contributing $5.00. I have until Monday morning to decide. Just after 4:00, my son brought the mail in and there was a letter from a company requesting I give them a call. I call them right away. They offered me a position different than the one I applied and interviewed for. The pay: $2 more per hour than the highest point of my requested pay scale. No medical and No dental. Private company retirement plan (unsure if company paid, matched or if I contribute the whole thing on a bi-weekly or monthly basis). What they offer in lieu of an actual medical plan is an extra $150 per month that I can put aside if a medical need arises. He just said think about it and give him a call back in a couple of days. Offer number one, I really don' t want nor was interested in at the time of interview and actually acted that way. Pay is kinda low for my experience but within the request. Benefits appear to be wonderful. Offer number two, I am interested in the actual position and pay is commensurate with my experience (I think) and the medical benefits are okay. (Dental, I really don' t need because son and I can stay on with hubby) and I don' t understand retirement plan. Sounds kind of scammy to me. Offer number three: I am totally interested in the position. I put my all into the first, and second interviews for that one. The pay is more than I expected and the extra $150 per month for medical is great. (Hubby pays $295 per month through his medical insurance at work for family coverage, if he takes me off and keeps my son on he will be paying the employee plus child rate of $195 per month. If he takes my son and me off and just switches to the employee rate just for himself, he will be paying $145). So, really, math wise the end amount is exactly the same. I am still waiting for an offer on another position that I really really really want with my state' s government. So, is it better, do you think, if I take the job I really am interested in with no medical but an extra amount monthly and going through a private "company retirement" or take the job that I am interested in with the actual medical insurance? I am not asking for anyone to make a decision for me, but to give me your input regarding the different types of offers I have been made. And, why is it that I get nothing for months and then three offers in less than 1 1/2 hours? If the actual work was all the same, I' d take number 1 in a heartbeat. A few dollars less but 100% medical is nearly impossible to find. Since the work is all different, take the one that you' ll enjoy the most. Since you don't really need the medical, take the job you really want the most of the three of them; I would not wait on the other one.... If you take the last one, without medical benefits, why then would you consider having your husband take you or your son off his policy? I can assure you if you got sick or needed any kind of medical treatments, even if for just a minor injury or illness, and needed any kind of tests, it would be more than $150--for one week probably! You should never be without actual health insurance--that extra $150/month can go toward the copays and coinsurance amounts you pay on your husband's policy. Most companies will allow a spouse to stay on the employer's plan if the spouse is not eligible for coverage through his/her employer, which you will not be. You should take the one you will enjoy the most. Money & benefits are not everything there is to working.... If the third job is lucrative enough without fooling around with your husband's insurance coverage then choose door number 3. Better pay and enjoyable work is a good combination. Use the extra "insurance" money for deductibles and co-pays. Believe me $1,800/year won't cover anything for you and your son... stay on hubby's plan. My out of pocket costs for wife, son and myself was $4,200+. Well, we have discussed this and hubby talked to his benefits coordinator and I have called the third company to accept the offer. The coordinator did state that I will need to let the employer know that I am on someone' s insurance and leave it to my new employer to decide if he still wants to povide me with the extra monthly money. If I accepted the money and did not tell them, hubby coud be responsible for paying his company back or, at the very worst, risk being dropped from the insurance premiums altogether. (which I really don' t think is fair, but I don' t know about these things) I was asked to stop by tomorrow morning and complete the employee hire paperwork and they would like me to start 2 weeks from Monday. Which would be April 16th. It isn' t exactly what I wanted to begin with but while talking about it and discussing the pros and cons I have decided that I will be happier there than at the other two companies. Actually, I will be happier in that position than in the one I actually interviewed for originally. I was informed at the interview that it was my "never let a client go away angry" attitude that drew them to me at the very beginning. Congratulations! I hope this opportunity works out well for you! As an aside, I cannot see why you continuing to be covered under your husband' s insurance would affect your new employer offering you that extra $150/month--that apparently is not meant to "be" health insurance," nor would it even begin to provide for a person' s entire medical expenses over the course of a year. If they simply do not offer medical insurance, and this extra per month is a "standard" benefit of theirs, I don' t see why they would not pay it out... Well, I went to the company that I just hired on to and filled out paperwork this morning. I asked them about the extra $150 per month in lieu of medical benefits. Because this particular firm is a branch of a multi-state law firm, the head office honchos sent the corporate benefits coordinator to help me out with the paperwork. Apparently she has been hanging around since Tuesday waiting for a decision to be made on who to hire and for that person to accept. (It was me). Anyway, I explained to her what the benefit's coordinator at hubby's job said and, after rolling her eyes and commenting that they are being small minded about a measly $150, she stated that the extra money is supposed to be for me to go out and purchase a policy and then make monthly payments toward it. It is done this way in every firm branch except the corporate office because
But the point is, with 38 different states to deal with, it wasn't worth the cost of two extra accountants. Because everybody else in the branch (a whopping 7 people are getting between $150 and $325 extra per month for their medical) she doesn't want me to miss out on the extra money. So they are going to continue giving me that amount evey month towards medical costs such as co-pays and hubby, son and I can each go get half our teeth cleaned at the dentist. So, in a nutshell, what she wrote down in the paperwork is that I am getting the money to cover the medical costs not covered by hubby's insurance. I think that will work out. My husbands company offers the same incentive. It is actually $750.00 per year not to participate in their medical insurance. It encourages dual income families that have a choice of what company benefits to enroll in to chose the spouse/partners company. I suppose it ends up saving the employer quite a bit of benefit money. The last time I read up on it , it was something like it will cost the employer 25% of the employees base salary for benefits. | |
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