It has been a busy few days in our office. The 2027 Medicare plans went live on Medicare.gov on Thursday morning, and since then our team has been pulling every plan, reading the documents behind them, and lining up the changes, because next week our advisors sit down with our clients, plan by plan, to walk through exactly what changed for the coverage they already have. I am not an advisor. I am an engineer, and this is the part of the year I look forward to most, because the data finally exists and we get to find out what it says. Here is what we have learned so far.
How many plans are there for 2027?
More than last year. When we pulled every plan on October 1, Medicare.gov listed 101 plans from 18 companies for Scottsdale, ZIP 85255: 92 Advantage plans, 40 of them special needs plans for people with certain conditions or who also have Medicaid, plus 9 stand-alone drug plans. Las Vegas, ZIP 89117, has 81 plans from 11 companies. For comparison, the same Scottsdale search in September showed 17 companies and 88 Advantage plans for 2026. More choice is good news. It also means more to compare, and our walk-through of the search shows how to do it yourself.
Are there really more deductibles this year?
Yes, and now we can count them. At our public workshop on Friday, the presenters' one-line warning about deductibles was "there's more of them." The data agrees. Maricopa County has 52 standard Advantage plans in both years, meaning the ones that are not special needs plans. In 2026, 11 of the 52 had a deductible for medical care. For 2027, 16 of the 52 list one, and one more plan had not posted its number yet when we checked. On the drug side, the most any plan can charge for a drug deductible rose from $615 in 2026 to "no more than $700" in 2027, and 6 of the 9 stand-alone drug plans in Maricopa set theirs at the full $700. None of that is in the headline premium.
Did the out-of-pocket limits change?
They went up. The out-of-pocket maximum is the most an Advantage plan can make you pay in a year for covered medical care in its network, not counting prescriptions. Across the same 52 standard plans, the median in-network limit, the point where half the plans are higher and half are lower, was $4,425 in 2026. For 2027 it is $4,825. The highest among those 52 rose from $7,900 to $8,900. Drugs have a separate yearly cap of $2,400 in 2027. A plan can look the same on the cover and still ask you to carry more of the risk, which is why our advisors read this line first.
What can't Medicare.gov show yet?
Three things, all normal for the first days of a new plan year. On October 1, none of the 52 standard Advantage plans in Maricopa had 2027 doctor information loaded on Medicare.gov, so the site cannot yet tell you whether your doctors take a plan. Star ratings read "Coming Soon" on every 2027 plan. And the dental flag in the site's plan data read "not specified" for every plan in both ZIP codes, even for plans whose detail pages list cleanings and crowns. So our team went to the source: the companies' own Summary of Benefits documents for most of the plans, and next, their provider directories for the doctors our clients see.
What should I do with this?
Open your plan's Annual Notice of Change and find three numbers for 2027: the medical deductible, the drug deductible, and the out-of-pocket maximum. Compare each one to 2026. If your plan added a deductible or raised its limit, that is worth knowing before the Annual Enrollment Period opens on October 15, and our earlier piece on what each number on a plan card covers will help you read them. Then check your doctors in the plan's own directory, and call the office to confirm they will be in that network in 2027. A change you make between October 15 and December 7 starts January 1.
What a Certified Medicare Planner® does differently
This week, it looks like what I have been watching from my desk: every plan in the county pulled on the first morning, the numbers compared year over year, the Summary of Benefits documents gathered and read before a single client meeting. Our advisors will walk into next week's client workshops already knowing which plans added a deductible, which raised their limits, and which ones Medicare.gov cannot fully describe yet. That is the work behind a recommendation, and it is why the conversation starts with your plan's numbers, not the headlines. The advisors are at 602-281-3898.
You Finished the Series
Up next: Take-Home Notes →The Medicare workshop, in print. Every section of the live show, one at a time and just as fun: the two paths, the words that decide your bill, the calendar, Medicare.gov step by step, and which one you are.
Disclaimer: This article is for educational purposes only. It is not sponsored, endorsed, or otherwise representative of Medicare or the federal Medicare program. American Retirement Advisors is not a government agency. For official Medicare information, visit medicare.gov or call 1-800-MEDICARE (1-800-633-4227).