Skilled-Nursing Facility Benefits
–
Medicare provides up to 100 days of care in a
Medicare certified skilled-nursing facility (SNF) per benefit period (as
defined above) if the individual was an inpatient in an acute care hospital
for at least 3 days during the 30 days immediately prior to admission to the
SNF and it has been determined they are in need of daily skilled services.
Medicare defines "daily" as needing seven days per week of skilled-nursing
care and at least five days per week of skilled
therapy.
Medicare pays for the first 20 days in a SNF. For
days 21 through 100 a co-insurance amount ($109.50 per day in 2004-3) is
due. Note: The dollar information is subject to change; practitioners should
update their references as changes are issued.
Social Security
– Individuals qualify for Social Security
retirement benefits as early as age 62 if they have held a job and paid
Social Security taxes for at least 10 years.
It provides monthly cash benefits to
retirees and their dependents, to disabled workers and their dependents and
to surviving dependents of deceased workers and retirees.
Statement of Funeral Goods and Services Selected
–
The Statement of Funeral Goods and Services
Selected (Statement) is an itemized list of the goods and services that the
consumer has selected during the arrangements conference. The Statement
allows consumers to evaluate their selections and to make any desired
changes.
Target Market
– There are two target markets
for this service: older adults and caregivers for older adults (usually
their children). A typical older client for ElderCare/PrimePlus Services is
someone without an adequate local system of support. This may be because a
spouse is deceased or incapacitated, or there are no children living in the
area who are capable of, or willing to, assist the parent. Profiling the
caregivers, usually adult children, is a more difficult matter.
Individually, children may not have sufficient resources, but if they pool
their resources, Elder Care Services may be affordable. The markets
described above apply to potential clients for the full range of ongoing
Elder Care/ Prime Plus Services. The potential market for clients who would
benefit from planning for the costs of long-term care and evaluation of care
options is much greater. Clients at every income level can benefit from
planning for these costs and the earlier a client plans, the greater choices
they will have in the future.
Testamentary Trust –
A testamentary trust is created by the maker's
will, funded by the estate, and administered by a trustee named in the will.
Its primary goal is to appoint someone to manage the assets included in the
trust. Incidental to this goal is the saving on estate taxes. There are
several advantages to using a testamentary trust. One is that the maker can
determine how the assets will be paid to the heirs. Sound financial
management of the assets may also allow the assets to grow and produce
additional income. Also, a by-pass trust may be structured. In this
arrangement the spouse can benefit from the trust during their lifetime, in
which the principal is held in trust for other beneficiaries. Any remainder,
even if it has doubled or tripled in value, produces no new estate taxes
because the value of the trust was set for tax purposes at the time of
death.
Trusts
–
Trusts are an important element in the management of a client's estate.
Trusts are legal arrangements by which the legal ownership and the
beneficial ownership of assets are separated. Trusts can be divided into two
major categories, revocable or irrevocable. Irrevocable trusts can not be
changed (with very few exceptions) once they are put in place. They can be
important in tax planning for larger estates, sometimes taking the form of
insurance or a charitable trust. Each can take on many forms or variations.
Revocable trusts are one of the most common estate planning tools for
individuals. They can be amended and/or changed at any time before the
person making the trust becomes incapacitated or dies. When working with an
older client, it is
important to continuously review and update any revocable trusts that may
exist in order to prevent conflicts and misunderstandings as well as to
ensure the client's wishes will be carried out in the event of
incapacitation or death.
Viatical Settlements
– Viatical settlements
refer to situations where an individual sells the benefits of their life
insurance policy to a third party at a discount in order to get cash to pay
for costly health care services. Viatical settlement companies may pay 60%
of the face value of a policy to a person with a life expectancy of two
years or less or as much as 80% to an individual with a life expectancy of
six months or less. The industry generally uses the term “Viatical
Settlement” to refer to a transaction involving a terminally or chronically
ill insured and a “Life Settlement” to refer to a transaction involving an
insured who is not terminally or chronically ill, generally over the age of
sixty-five (65).
