Every September, Medicare Advantage and Part D drug plans mail their members a document called the Annual Notice of Change, often shortened to ANOC. It's the official notice of what will be different starting January 1.
Plans have to get it to you by September 30. It often travels with, or is followed by, a much longer document called the Evidence of Coverage. The Annual Notice of Change is the shorter of the two, and it's the one to read first.
Who gets one: people enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan or a stand-alone Part D drug plan. If you have Original Medicare only, or Original Medicare with a supplement policy and no drug plan, you won't receive one.
How to recognize it
Look on the cover for the words Annual Notice of Change and two consecutive years — the one ending and the one beginning. That pair of years is the fastest way to confirm you're holding the right document.
If the envelope contains several documents, the Annual Notice of Change is the thinner one. The Evidence of Coverage is the plan's full rulebook. You can keep it for reference.
The pages worth reading
The notice follows a standard order that every plan uses. After the cover and the table of contents comes the useful part: a table comparing this year with next year, in two columns.
| Look for this section | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Summary of important costs | The two-column table: what you pay this year next to what you'll pay next year |
| Changes to drug coverage | Whether any drug moved to a different tier, left the list, or now needs an extra step before it's covered |
| Changes to the provider and pharmacy network | Whether your doctors, specialists, hospital and pharmacy are still in the network next year |
| Changes to benefits and services | Which extra services were added, reduced or removed |
If you only have ten minutes, read the two-column cost table and the drug section. Those are where the changes show up that people most often wish they'd caught in time.
Mark the differences — don't read every word
The notice isn't written to be read cover to cover. It's written to be compared. A practical way to do it:
- Take the two-column table and mark, in pencil, every line where the two columns are different.
- In the drug section, look up only the drugs you actually take. Skip the rest.
- In the network section, look up only the names of your own doctors and your pharmacy.
- Copy everything you marked onto a single sheet of paper.
What ends up on that sheet is your personal summary of the year. It's usually three or four lines, not forty pages.
What to do with your summary
If nothing on the sheet matters to you, you may not need to do anything: if your plan continues next year, you stay in it automatically. If something does matter — a drug that changed tier, a doctor who left the network — you have until December 7 to look at other options, with changes taking effect January 1.
Our guide to the five questions to answer before you decide picks up exactly where this one ends.
If the letter never arrived
You can ask your plan for a copy directly; the member services number is on your membership card. You can also look up plan information on Medicare.gov or call 1-800-MEDICARE (TTY 1-877-486-2048).
It's worth watching your mail closely in September. The envelope doesn't always look important.
Free printable
The annual review checklist
Seven things to check before December 7, in the order they appear in your plan's letter. The email version is coming soon.