Medicare Supplement

How Medigap Plan Letters Work Under Medicare in Springdale

SPRINGDALE, Ark. — If you have Original Medicare and you've started shopping for extra coverage, you've probably run into a wall of letters: Plan A, Plan B, Plan G, Plan N, and a few more. Those letters aren't random. They're part of a system Medicare uses to make Medigap plans easier to compare, no matter which insurance company sells them.

Making sense of Medigap in Springdale

Here's a plain-English guide to what Medicare Supplement Insurance — often called Medigap — actually does, and how the standardized letters work for people on Medicare in Washington County.

What Medigap is designed to do

Medigap is private insurance that works alongside Original Medicare (Part A and Part B). It doesn't replace Medicare. Instead, it helps pay some of the out-of-pocket costs Original Medicare leaves behind, like coinsurance, copayments, and in some cases the Part A deductible.

A few key points to keep in mind:

• Medigap only works with Original Medicare. It does not work with Medicare Advantage.
• Medigap does not include prescription drug coverage. For drug coverage, you'd add a separate Part D plan.
• You pay a monthly premium for a Medigap policy on top of your Part B premium.
• Medigap generally doesn't cover things Medicare doesn't cover — routine dental, vision, hearing aids, or long-term care.

Why the letters exist

In most states, including Arkansas, Medigap plans are standardized by the federal government. That means Plan G from one company covers the same core benefits as Plan G from another company. The premium and customer service can differ, but the benefits behind the letter are the same.

That's the whole point of the letter system: it lets you compare apples to apples. If you're looking at two Plan N policies from two different carriers in Springdale, you're comparing the same set of benefits — the main difference will be price and the company standing behind it.

The currently sold plans are labeled A, B, C, D, F, G, K, L, M, and N. Plans C and F are only available if you were eligible for Medicare before January 1, 2020. Everyone else chooses from the remaining letters.

How the letters differ

Each letter offers a different mix of coverage. Some plans cover nearly everything Original Medicare leaves behind; others cover less and come with lower premiums. A few plans (K and L) use cost-sharing, where you pay a percentage until you hit an out-of-pocket limit for the year.

Rather than memorizing every letter, most people focus on two questions:

1. How much predictable monthly cost am I comfortable with? Plans with richer benefits tend to have higher premiums. 2. How much am I willing to pay when I actually use care? Leaner plans cost less monthly but leave more for you to handle at the doctor or hospital.

You can see a side-by-side benefits chart on Medicare.gov's Medigap page, which is the most reliable place to compare what each letter includes.

When you can buy Medigap matters — a lot

Timing is one of the most important things to understand about Medigap, and it's where a lot of Springdale residents get tripped up.

You have a one-time Medigap Open Enrollment Period — a six-month window that starts the month you're 65 and enrolled in Part B. During that window, insurance companies can't turn you down or charge you more because of your health history. This is called guaranteed issue.

Outside that window, in most cases, insurers in Arkansas can use medical underwriting. That means they can look at your health and decide whether to offer you a policy, and at what price. It doesn't mean you can't switch later — many people do — but it's not automatic.

This is different from the Medicare Annual Enrollment Period (Oct. 15 – Dec. 7), which is for Part D and Medicare Advantage, not Medigap.

How this fits with the rest of Medicare in 2026

If you're weighing Medigap, it helps to see the whole picture:

• Part D has a new out-of-pocket cap of $2,100 for 2026, and the maximum Part D deductible is $615. The old "donut hole" was eliminated in 2025.
• If you'd like to spread drug costs evenly across the year, the Medicare Prescription Payment Plan is an option to ask your Part D plan about.
• IRMAA surcharges — higher premiums for higher earners — start above $109,000 in income for a single filer in 2026.
• Springdale is in Washington County, where plan availability for Medicare Advantage and Part D is set at the county level. Medigap, on the other hand, is regulated at the state level in Arkansas, so your Medigap options aren't tied to your county.