As a born and raised Canadian, I have been blessed with the universal health care system. This meant that I could visit the doctor’s office freely whenever I had any questions or concerns about my health—no matter how small. And at Microsoft Canada, I had an incredible benefits plan that covered wellness, physiotherapy, massages, dental hygiene, mental health counselling, and more.

As I prepared for my move across the border, I was nervous about what my new healthcare reality would look like. I spoke to some Canadian peers who made a similar move in previous years and heard that (fortunately) Microsoft offered some of the best health insurance plans out there. This was reassuring, but I had to see it for myself! Today, I’ll be sharing what I have learned about the system so far.

Healthcare Plans & Providers

In Canada, we only had one insurance provider that provided a few different plan options. Here in the U.S., we can choose between different insurance providers AND different plan options―which gets quite complicated and confusing. Although the complete guide is nearly 500 pages long, below are a few elements that I had to consider in choosing my health insurance plan:

• Deductible is the amount that you need to pay out-of-pocket before your health plan provider will cover the costs. For example, you must pay $500 out-of-pocket in a calendar year before you get any coverage.
• Co-pay happens when you visit a healthcare provider (e.g. the Doctor) and both you and the health insurance provider split the final bill for each event. This is ideal for those who don’t expect to meet the deductible in the calendar year or do not want to pay a high deductible.
• HSA is your health savings account which has tax benefits through the IRS and does not expire. You can contribute and withdraw this money without paying taxes for eligible health spending situations (e.g. prescribed medications, doctor’s visits). Some employers will contribute a complementary lump sum on your behalf each year.
• FSA is your flexible spending account which is ironically not that flexible and can only be spent on certain eligible expenses and unused funds also expire each year.
• Coverage network refers to the organizations, institutions, and healthcare providers that are associated with a particular healthcare plan provider. For example, if you choose a health insurance plan with Premera, you would want to find doctors that are “in-network” to get full coverage under your Premera plan and avoid additional fees.

Decision Time 👀 After chatting with several people, I ended up choosing the health insurance plan with an HSA because I wanted to take advantage of the complementary lump sum and potential tax benefits. If I end up unhappy with this plan, I do have the option of changing my plan if I follow the guidelines.

Differences in Benefits

Note: These are my own observations and understanding of concepts

Canada 🇨🇦	U.S. 🇺🇸
Dental and vision are benefits that go on top of universal healthcare	Healthcare, dental, and vision seem to be grouped together under insurance plans
You receive a maximum amount per category (e.g. dental work) that you are responsible for using up in the year which sometimes can be carried over	You cannot carry over amounts, it resets every year
There is flexibility in choosing providers as long as they allow you to claim insurance	You must choose in-network providers (or else you may need to pay extra)
Preventative care is included under universal health care (e.g. immunizations, annual check-up)	Preventative care is included under the insurance plan (i.e. you get a “free” annual check-up)

More Surprises

Note: These are comparisons from my experience working at Microsoft

Canada 🇨🇦	U.S. 🇺🇸
Stat/paid holidays every month so there was always a long weekend to look forward to 🙌	Fewer stat/paid holidays so some of the months seem very long 🥲
12 month maternity leave (note: my predecessor was on mat leave for 18 months during the pandemic)	6 month maternity leave (which is considered generous because the law only requires 3 months)
Lump sum to spend on health and wellbeing expenses	3x lump sum to spend on health and wellbeing expenses

Conclusion

Ultimately, I am very grateful for the comprehensive plans and benefits that Microsoft provides me in the U.S.. However, it is very different from what I grew up with my entire life—so it will definitely take some time for me to adjust to this new way of life. Hopefully this is helpful to those who are planning on moving to Microsoft in the U.S.!

Stay tuned for a future blog post where I will talk about my first visit to the Doctors… and what a WEIRD experience it was 😳

Found this helpful? The best ways you can support my platform and your career development are through:

• Subscribing to my monthly newsletter for updates on new blog content and resources.
• Referring others to Resume Rescue which has helped 160+ people land jobs @ places like Microsoft, Amazon, Salesforce, and Shopify.
• Following #KKARENISM on LinkedIn to see which recruiters and hiring managers are #hiring so you can network with them when applying for a job

Thank you for your time! Please share your feedback & ideas via LinkedIn or at kkarenism@gmail.com