How to contact Medicare

Medicare publishes one telephone number, and it is answered around the clock. It is also the wrong number for the single thing people most often call about, which is signing up. Medicare is run by one agency and enrolled by another, and the plans that deliver most of the coverage are run by companies that answer their own phones. Knowing which of the four handles your question saves the transfer.

The one number, and when it is answered

The main line is 1-800-MEDICARE, which dials as 1-800-633-4227. TTY users call 1-877-486-2048. Medicare says the line and its live chat are staffed by a real person 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except some federal holidays. The chat is at Medicare.gov/talk-to-someone. Letters go to Medicare, PO Box 1270, Lawrence, KS 66044.

Before dialing, have your Medicare card in front of you. The handbook asks callers to speak clearly and follow the voice prompts to reach the right category, which is what routes the call to someone who can see your claims.

What that number can settle, and what it cannot

1-800-MEDICARE handles what happens after you are enrolled: claims and what Medicare paid, what Original Medicare covers, replacing a lost card, ordering the handbook, complaints about care or about a plan, and starting an appeal.

It does not enroll you. It does not change your address. It cannot tell you what a private plan will pay for a specific drug at a specific pharmacy, because that is the plan’s own formulary rather than Medicare’s.

Signing up is Social Security’s job

If you are already drawing Social Security or Railroad Retirement Board benefits when you turn 65, Part A and Part B start automatically. If you are close to 65 and not drawing benefits, you have to sign up yourself, and you do it at SSA.gov/medicare/sign-up. Social Security also takes address changes, applications for Extra Help with drug costs, and appointments, which the handbook suggests making about three months before you turn 65.

The division matters because Part B has a late enrollment penalty that is added to the monthly premium for as long as you hold Part B. Calling the wrong office in the month a deadline falls is how people lose that window.

If you worked for a railroad

Railroad Retirement Board beneficiaries deal with the RRB rather than Social Security. The number is 1-877-772-5772, TTY 1-312-751-4701, and the site is RRB.gov. Everything after enrollment, including claims and appeals, still runs through 1-800-MEDICARE.

Your plan answers for your plan

If you are in a Medicare Advantage plan or a stand-alone Part D drug plan, the company running it decides its own network, its own formulary and its own prior authorization rules. Questions about any of those go to the number on the plan card. Medicare can take a complaint about how a plan behaved, but it cannot look up what the plan covers.

The Medicare figures tracker carries the premiums and deductibles that apply whatever plan you are in, and open enrollment is explained here.

Free counseling that is not a sales call

Every state runs a State Health Insurance Assistance Program, funded federally and not connected to any insurance company or plan. Counselors help with rights, billing problems, complaints about care, comparing plans, buying a Medigap policy and applying for Extra Help. It is free and personalized, and because nobody there earns a commission, it is the only plan-comparison advice on this list with no seller behind it. Find yours at shiphelp.org, or in the state-by-state list in the back of the Medicare & You handbook.

Help with the costs comes from your state

Medicare Savings Programs, which pay some Medicare costs for people with limited income, are run by states, not by Medicare. So is Medicaid. Medicare’s contact page points to a state office finder for both. Someone who qualifies for a Savings Program is usually enrolled automatically in Extra Help for drug costs, which is why it is worth asking even when a call feels unlikely to help.

If you need another format or another language

Medicare provides free auxiliary aids and services. To ask for information in braille, large print, audio or another accessible format, call 1-800-MEDICARE, email altformatrequest@cms.hhs.gov, or fax 1-844-530-3676. Interpreters are available on the main line in many languages at no charge.

A complaint about discrimination goes to the Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights on 1-800-368-1019, TTY 1-800-537-7697, rather than to Medicare.

Two numbers that are easy to confuse with Medicare’s

The Health Insurance Marketplace, which is the Affordable Care Act exchange rather than Medicare, is 1-800-318-2596, TTY 1-855-889-4325. And people signing up for the Medicare benefit that covers immunosuppressive drugs after a kidney transplant are told to call Social Security on 1-877-465-0355, TTY 1-800-325-0778, which is a different number from Social Security’s general line.

The short version

Enrolling, addresses and Extra Help go to Social Security. Claims, coverage, cards, complaints and appeals go to 1-800-MEDICARE. What a plan covers goes to the plan. Help paying goes to your state. Advice on choosing goes to your SHIP counselor. Nothing on this page costs money, and no one on these lines should ask you for payment to keep coverage.