Medicare Prescription Drug Coverage

To pay the lowest possible monthly premium for prescription drug coverage, a person must sign up for coverage when he or she is first eligible. If the person doesn't join a Medicare drug plan when first eligible and goes without creditable prescription drug coverage for 63 continuous days or more, he or she may have to pay a late enrollment penalty to join a plan later. (Creditable prescription drug coverage is drug coverage from another source that is expected to pay, on average, at least as much as Medicare's standard prescription drug coverage.)