Tricare Help: Troops can’t prevent eligible family members from receiving benefits - Getting out, military health issues - Navy Times

Tricare Help: Troops can’t prevent eligible family members from receiving benefits

Answering your questions on Tricare.

Q. My son’s father is in the Army, but my son is not receiving child support payments or health care benefits. I can’t afford private insurance. Is there a way that I can get my son some of his father’s benefits without his father’s help setting it up?

To use Tricare, the eligible family member must be properly enrolled. It’s the service member’s responsibility to do that. If he won’t, federal law has ways to make sure it is done.

By law, the benefit flows directly to the beneficiary. The service member’s permission is not required.

Call the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System support office at 800-538-9552. DEERS will want the father’s full name and Social Security number, and your son’s full name. Include your full name, too, and a telephone number where you can be reached during the day.

DEERS is part of the Defense Department. Everything you say to its employees is confidential. That office will provide guidance for what you need to do. That’s its job.

If you have the father’s military address, you also may want to write to his commander. Just address your letter to “Commanding Officer,” and then write “Confidential” and the father’s military address below that.

Don’t put the father’s name on the envelope. You want your letter to go to his commanding officer, not to the father.

Tell him about your problem. You may want to include copies of any correspondence you have had with the father about the matter.

Q. I am a 20-year-old Tricare dependent, and I am engaged to be married. My understanding is that I will lose my coverage when I turn 21 or get married. But I heard that the new health care law extends that to age 26 even if a dependent is married. Is that true?

No. Congress recently passed a law that allows the Defense Department to extend the eligibility of unmarried children until age 26 under certain circumstances. The coverage will require payment of a monthly premium. That amount is yet to be determined.

Q. I’m over 65 and enrolled in Tricare for Life. My wife is 63 and enrolled in Tricare Prime. If I decide to drop Tricare for Life and go with a private supplement, can my wife continue to be enrolled in Tricare Prime until she’s 65?

Yes. Regardless of what you do, your wife can retain her Tricare Prime coverage until she becomes entitled to Medicare and Tricare for Life at age 65.

Write to Tricare Help, Times News Service, 6883 Commercial Drive, Springfield, VA 22159; or e-mail us. In e-mail, include the word “Tricare” in the subject line and do not attach files. Get Tricare advice anytime on our blog.