I provided insurance for the SDs for one year....never again.

I have super good insurance and it was cheap to add them ($140 total per month).  The deal was that DH and BM pay me $70 each to keep them on my plan.  WELL I had to ask them each and every month, sometimes more than once for that money - hey guys, once a month send me $70.  YOU both are saving $.  DH eventually paid me back. After that year, at open enrollment I did my investigations. 

Turns out the CA states BM covers them on her insurance.  How about that then?  And her cost is almost several hundred GREATER than mine.  I tell DH they are coming off my plan on x date.  He and BM need to figure it out.  Oh, she tried to say she couldn't add them mid year...oh yes you can, it's called a "qualifying event" (I could read her employer's policy because she's a public employee).  Then she said I had to keep them on because it was my responsibility (around the same time she said I had to help pay for their college...BWAHAHAHAHA!). 

DH knows I will never have them on my plan again.  I will not be taken advantage of twice.

The boys are on my insurance, but DH has his own policy through his employer. I can't carry DH without a steep penalty since his employer provides it, and he only keeps it for the HSA and catastrophic coverage. His regular care he can get through the VA for free.

My health insurance is great - like, REALLY excellent. The boys are covered under mine because it's a traditional plan with ZERO OOP for in-network services (minus a small list of things that have co-pays) and costs less than DH's crappy plan. We keep then covered because BM was (is?) committing Medicaid fraud and we wanted to protect ourselves and the boys.

I'm surprised your employer allowed you to add DH but not Munchkin. Any plan I have ever had was more expensive when you added a spouse than just adding kids. I also didn't think plans could discriminate dependents - like, a stepkid is the same as a bio kid is the same as an adopted kid is the same as a differently-abled dependent.

I'm not saying you SHOULD add Munchkin, but I would consider the cost to your household. We chose mine because, in the long run, it would cost us way less OOP. Your DH looking for a non-employer sponsored plan could be pricey, and he's on the hook for his portion of her medical care no matter whose insurance she is on. Even if she is on your insurance, that doesn't make YOU liable for her bill - insurance doesn't bill you, the facility that provided the insurance bills whoever received the service or their guardian.

Our insurance is all over the place.  SO's kids are on our state's CHIP plan.  They can qualify for that through either SO or BM, but BM's income is such that there's no premium if she signs them up, and that's what the CO provides.  Both SO and BM are veterans and are insured through the VA.  I don't get insurance through my employer, so I'll be on my father's family policy until I'm 26.  SO and I aren't married yet, but nothing will change insurance-wise in a few months when we are.  

Is there anything in your DH's divorce paperwork stipulating which parent is to carry insurance?

Oh well, looks like your DH is going to have to contact BM to find out what HER plan is. Good on you for telling your H No. He doesn't even have all the facts, but looked to you for the easy solution (for him).

I had Spawn on my insurance and figured once she aged out, got married, or got a job with insurance I could remove her...nope!! I was required to carry her until she was 26!

I could petition to get her off, but I was advised it would never happen, even with the petitioning. Best option was to cancel my insurance and have DH pick it up minus his Spawn.

I  carried my SD's on my insurance from the time that my DH and I were married.  I'm not sure what you mean by your boss said there weren't "provisions" for it?  With my company there are multiple options.  You can elect Employee, Employee and Spouse or Employee and family (spouse plus kids).  The cost to the employee is fairly cheap with "just" the employee but goes up more if you add a spouse and then more if you add kids. 

So, it should cost YOU more money..but my understanding is that Skids can be covered by our plans, even if they DON'T live with us.  It used to be they needed to be dependents that lived with you.. but no longer.

Honestly, there wasn't really the problem of BM using it because just because it was my plan, did NOT mean that I had any financial obligation for the visits.  DH was obligated to 50% of the bills for care.. so that would have been W"ORSE if they weren't on a plan anyway.  The upside is that when there were a few expensive situations... I met my deductible faster and more of MY stuff was at the copay rate...lol.

While I can understand not wanting to do something to benefit the EX... this literally shouldn't be a problem if your DH is willing to reimburse you for the difference between the cost of your "single person plan" and the family version.  I think that BM losing the child's insurance may be a qualifying event too.

Assuming you have a custody order what does it say?

 Avoiding insurance completely for fear BM will use it is stupid since almost every order requires parents split medical expenses.

Our state orders both parents to provide health insurance unless what is offered is deemed unreasonable. SO actually had the court decide what his employer provided was not acceptable and now the kids are on state insurance because BM’s pay is below the poverty rate since she doesn’t have to get a better job and SO subsidizes her expenses with child support.

Before the state insurance BM was providing it through her work. SO was order to pay half of the children’s premiums. So if the total plan was 150 but BM alone was 100 he was to pay half of the 50 which would be 25. They did consider that when they calculated his child support but it only lowered his payments by 4 dollars every two weeks while he was required to pay BM directly 25.

If BD was still paying for his own insurance I’m sure he would add the children to his but since you are covering him now he would have to find a separate plan for them which will most likely cost more than if you just added them to yours.

In the end NO you don’t have to add them but you didn’t have to add him either. Clearly you’re ok supporting him to some degree. Either you’re refusing to spite BM which hurts the child and your partner or you’re refusing to spite the child which in turn still hurts your partner and I wonder why you are with him if you care so little for the kid you’re not willing to help him by including her on your plan.

Then again I don’t know the ends and outs of your finical situation and if you truly can’t add the child (which is unusual) then the point is null and void.

BMs can and have run up copays.  Our tried to do it.  In our state, a percentage is assigned to each party responsible for co-pays and Dh's was included in his CS each month,  After a state set amount is reached, CP can then petition FOC for reimbursement.  Knowing this exists, BM can run up that medical with stupid visits.  Just to stick it to her ex.  Don't even get me started on braces for teeth.  That's a whole other issue.  

Clove, knowing the type of BM you have, I wouldn't add her.  It just opens another door for BM to use to mess with you.  Not worth it in your case.  Keep those steel walls in place to keep her out as much as possible.  You are right, she has two parents and you are not one of them.  Now, if for some reason DH was able to get sole custody of SD, and complete control over her, that might change my opinion. The way it stands now, don't do it.  

Also check into which insurance gets used first.  In my state it goes by birthdate of policy carrier.  

I have 4 kids on mine (my 2, DH’s 2), and it has been ok so far- about 4 years now. It is in his CO that he provides insurance for them. She tried to backtrack on that when she realized we get a CS credit for it, but DH didn’t bite. 

I have better insurance than DH but my employer will not cover Skids unless I can claim them as dependants on my taxes...which I can't.  Judge said since DH can't prove that the child tax credit is a "windfall" for BM that there was no reason for them to alternate...yet DH has to cover SS on his insurance.  It's twisted how judges treat the other parent sometimes.  Makes me mad.  Nothing is fair. 

My lawyer told me to never add exSS to my benefits plan as it would've put me in a parental position with the child and should something happen to exSO, exBM could use this against me and potentially obtain more from me than I'd want to voluntarily give. 

So the H provides medical, dental and vision for SD14 and SD13. BM takes them to Dr. for anything and everything. Because he pays out of pocket amounts (they get no cheap copays, his company gives them a wad of cash to pay for the OOP and god forbid something catastrophic happens), the BM (his ex) decided to get insurance and he pays the premiums and all copays as what she could get is much cheaper. Did I mention this was her first job in like 12-15 years? Plus she gets $2k in CS and we have them every Thursday and every other weekend... which is overkill compared to when I got divorced. Plus she has a guy living in her house with the kids that she moved in after 2 months of knowing him, 

So right before Christmas, she decides to up and QUIT her job because 'she didn't like it'. SERIOUSLY? Oh, but she still took her freshly purchased Ford Expedition and go on a 1.5 week road trip without the girls for Christmas. So her insurance was cancelled... leaving his crappy plan. (she's only had 2 interviews in the past month. And she wants a travelling job? My H and her BF both travel for work and I leave for work before the sun comes up so it won't work)

They were talking on speakerphone (without me) and SHE tells him to get THEIR children on MY insurance! WTF?!? Yes, he will pay me back, but that puts MY NAME as fiscally responsible for 2 kids that barely say 2 words to me. Would they agree to cosign my daughter's college loan with the promises that her dad will pay for it all? I highly doubt it!

It's the principle of not talking to me about it... then I send her an email asking for certain documents (with him cc'd) and she only responds to him? F that??! Why should I do either of them the favor?

So I tell him my feelings about not wanting to be involved in this and he flips out on me! 'It saves me money he says'... I don't care. I am really feeling like the third wheel and the past is the past and it needs to be that way. He's only seen my ex once because we bumped into him at a store.

Now I'm sort of brow beaten into something I don't want to do. If his insurance sucks, maybe he needs another job with better insurance.