I'm just a normal self-employed guy who trusted the NASE marketing pitch. For me it turned out to be a disaster, and I have learned that I'm not the only one who thinks NASE is a scam.

In the mean time. Do your own research. Type in "NASE sucks" in google and read all the horror stories. I know first hand that this is not a joke. See more links below.

Great article in Businessweek:
It's Enough to Make You Sick

Wall Street Journal:
States Probe Health-Policy Sales Promoted Though Associations
Nonprofit Groups That Tout Insurance Have Hidden Links
PDF of Article

Other complaints:
NASE/MEGA Complaints
Forum filled with NASE complaints
More NASE/MEGA complaints

Damning Quotes:
"Dana was stuck with almost $500,000 in medical bills that MEGA refused to cover, and now lives on her boat to save money on rent"

"Kevin Cruse, a 46-year-old firefighter in Parsons, Kan., says he canceled his National Association for the Self-Employed policy last year after six months because he says it paid so few of his family's medical claims."

"I found NASE's insurance to be a waste of money too. They never paid a single claim... even trips to the emergency room were declined. I finally got tired of fighting them and cancelled the insurance."

"Merrideth Tidwell, a former manager for UICI in Sarasota, Fla., says her superiors taught agents to withhold information about coverage limits from prospective customers. Ms. Tidwell, a top producing agent, according to a UICI internal newsletter, says she was instructed by managers to tear out a page from a brochure that explains coverage limits, or to not give brochures to customers."

"They are training agents to trick the consumer"

"I'm afraid we made a really stupid decision," says Mrs. Bloedel. "We trusted what the insurance salesman was saying. Insurance is like a foreign language to us."

"...but when I had acute appendicitis and gathered $27,000 in medical bills, I found that the small print, very small print, states that Mega Life and Health pays only 'covered expenses'"

"Again, NASE is a rip-off. Mega Life & Health don't pay for anything hardly. Terrible, terrible, terrible. Stay Away From NASE and Mega Health and Life - You do not need the quarterly premium increases, but that is what you will get. They are the bait and switch of the health insurance world - Low initial premium, and then increase, increase, increase! Absolutely the worst business decision I ever, ever, ever made was to get buy insurance from that outfit for about eighteen months."

"NASE/Mega: Bloodsucking, Floppy-footed Clowns .... Avoid these guys LIKE THE PLAGUE"

Search Google:
NASE fraud
NASE scam
NASE sucks
NASE class action
NASE Lawsuit
NASE bad
NASE bogus
NASE rip off
NASE evil
NASE/UICI class action

If you run a website, please link to this site. Help spread the word!

More to come...

Steve Gehrman

I was a member of NASE for about 4 years. How many of these "benefits" did I take advantage of?

ZERO, ZILTCH, NADA, NONE

In my experience, with a little research using the internet, you can find deals as good or better than offered to NASE members.

There's no reason to waste your money on NASE!

I like Air America, but they shouldn't be running ads for NASE. I can no longer listen or support Air America.

Write emails to Air America Radio and let them know that they should not accepts ads from NASE!!

"Did promises of low health insurance premiums by an "association" lead to problems for you? Numerous consumers who bought health insurance through these non-profit associations are learning the hard way that they're paying higher premiums for fewer benefits than they had expected. If you have a problem with such an association, or if you are a former association employee with knowledge of deceptive sales practices, contact us by clicking here."

www.nasesucks.org is not associated with James Hoyer, I'm just providing this link.

There's lots of great posts. Check it out!

So, given the fact that I don't know anything, I figured I needed help. I needed someone or some organization to help me find a good deal. So, I stumbled upon NASE and thought this was great. An organization to help the self-employed. That's exactly what I was looking for. I thought these guys must know more that I do, and they have probably found the best insurance company for someone like me. So, I called signed up and told them to send the insurance salesman over, I was ready to sign up.

A few days later a woman came over and told us all about the insurance. It all sounded good to me given the fact that since I was clueless, I have nothing to compare it to. I trusted NASE, and thought in the worst case, maybe it's not the best, but how bad could it be. Sign me up.

My wife and I were planning to have children. So, since we both rarely go to the doctor, that was our only concern. We asked the sales person a minimum of 4 times wether pregnancy and prenatal care were covered and every time we got the same response. "Yes, of course, it's all covered".

Well, there's not much more to the story, you probably all ready know the ending. My wife got pregnant, we go to the doctor and they contacted MEGA and they said "Pregnancy is not covered". So now I'm stuck with paying everything. Every ultra sound, every checkup, Cesarean section, hospital stay, nurse care, genetic tests, everything. We also spent money getting pregnant. My wife ended up getting pregnant naturally, but we went through a whole course of infertility treatments which were pretty expensive too.

It might not be so bad if the insurance was cheap, but we were paying $448 a month!!!

So, in conclusion I was lied to about the coverage, and they took advantage or my ignorance about health insurance. I trusted NASE was there to help the self-employed, but it seems they are there to prey on the self-employed. If my story was an isolated incident, I would blame myself, but similar stories are all over the internet.

Some more fun facts:

1) My prescription card never worked. I'm not sure why. I called a few times and they said there was some problem in the computer, not sure, but it was never fixed.

2) When I canceled my MEGA insurance, they decided they would get one more months payment out of me before canceling it. They automatically changed my account another $448 and sent me a letter saying that my policy would a month after I had canceled. I had to spend $25 calling my bank to put a stop on that automatic payment. Real nice MEGA!!