Doing this can be worth hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars in savings in a single year, and it's surprisingly simple. Free one-on-one counseling is available from local Medicare benefits counselors like me in every area of the country, through State Health Insurance Programs (SHIP). Many of these programs operate through local area agencies on aging, senior centers, and community health centers. .Medicare first began offering beneficiaries the chance to enroll in private Medicare HMOs' in the mid 1980's. That program was absorbed and expanded under the 1997 Balanced Budget Act, creating Medicare+Choice. To cut federal spending on Medicare, the Balanced Budget Act set payments to the private plans at 5% below the fee-for-service rates of traditional Medicare. But by 1999, Medicare+Choice plans were not renewing their contracts with Medicare and there was a widespread exodus, leaving more than 2 million seniors scrambling to find other coverage. .The "offset" rules for unemployment affected large numbers of seniors during the recent period of high unemployment. In Virginia, for example, the state unemployment insurance reserves dropped so low that a state law was triggered requiring cuts to the unemployment benefit payments of Social Security recipients in January 20By October, 30,000 jobless seniors in Virginia had been affected, and the offset completely wiped out the unemployment benefit of an additional 4,000. .Doc Fix for Medicare Providers – Establish a permanent solution in order to bring greater stability to doctor reimbursements, ensuring continued access. .The increased amounts are phased out for incomes over 0,000 for married couples filing jointly and qualifying widows or widowers, 2,500 for heads of household, and ,000 for all other taxpayers. .In a statement that was released on Thursday, Mary Johnson – Policy Analyst for The Senior Citizens League – said: "The bottom line is that Medicare Part B premiums rise several times faster than COLAs, and those premiums are now high enough to cause the net Social Security benefits of millions of people to remain flat for years at a time … This would make the fourth year in a row that this particular group has not seen a boost in their net Social Security benefits." .Since you were born in 1959, your full retirement age is 66 and 10 months. Starting benefits prior to your full retirement age will lower your monthly payments. If you were to retire at age 62 instead of age 66 and 10 months, a ,000 per month benefit would be permanently reduced to ,416— a reduction of about 29.17%. The longer you delay starting your benefit, the more you will receive. But age 66 and 10 months is NOT your maximum benefit age. Your maximum benefit comes at age 70, no matter when you were born. .When asked how Congress should address the lack of coverage, 79 percent of poll respondents said Medicare coverage should be expanded, while 14 percent said private Medicare Advantage plans that sometimes cover more of these services should be better promoted. Only 7 percent of respondents said Medicare's coverage of dental, vision, and hearing services should remain unchanged. .The following article is from "Kaiser Health News":