Whether you're at the Lexington plant, Earthmover, or headquarters in Greenville, the Medicare decisions you make in your last year at Michelin follow you for the rest of your life. Here's the roadmap.

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Michelin is one of South Carolina's largest private employers — roughly 10,000 people across plants in Lexington, Anderson, Greenville, and Spartanburg counties. The Lexington US5 plant alone has been building tires since 1981 with more than 1,600 team members, many of whom have been there for decades. Which means every year, a wave of Michelin employees right here in the Midlands hits the same milestone at the same time: turning 65, thinking about retirement, and staring at a Medicare decision nobody trained them for.

You spent a career building tires. Nobody expects you to be an expert on Part B enrollment windows. But the timing rules are unforgiving, and the most expensive Medicare mistakes we see are made by people leaving good jobs with good benefits — because good benefits are exactly what make the timing confusing.

Here's what a Michelin employee (or spouse) needs to know, in the order the decisions actually come at you.

Still working at Michelin at 65? You can probably wait — but not blindly

Because Michelin has far more than 20 employees, its group health plan stays primary while you're actively working, even after you turn 65. That means:

• You can delay Part B without penalty while you're covered under Michelin's active-employee plan. No late-enrollment penalty will chase you, as long as the coverage is from active employment — not COBRA, not retiree coverage.
• Most people still take Part A at 65, since it's premium-free if you've paid in for 10+ years. One big exception: if you're contributing to a Health Savings Account through a high-deductible plan, enrolling in any part of Medicare ends your ability to contribute. Michelin's plans have used HSA-style structures — so check which plan you're on before you touch Medicare enrollment. Get this wrong and you can trigger IRS tax problems on your HSA contributions.

The mistake we see: assuming "I'll just handle it all when I retire" without confirming your plan type. The other mistake: signing up for Part B at 65 "just to be safe" while still working — and paying premiums for coverage you didn't need yet.

The moment you retire, a clock starts — and it's shorter than you think

The day your active-employee coverage ends, you get an 8-month Special Enrollment Period to sign up for Part B without penalty. Eight months sounds like plenty. It isn't, for two reasons.

Reason one: the COBRA trap. Michelin retirees are often offered COBRA to bridge the gap, and it feels like the safe choice — same coverage, familiar network. But COBRA does not count as active employment coverage. Your 8-month Part B clock starts when you stop working, not when COBRA ends. Retirees who ride COBRA for 18 months and then enroll in Medicare discover they've blown past the window — facing a lifetime Part B penalty and a gap where COBRA paid almost nothing, because once you're Medicare-eligible, COBRA assumes Medicare is primary even if you never signed up. We wrote a whole article on this trap because it's that common — and it costs people for life.

Reason two: your Medigap window is even more valuable. When your Part B starts, you get a 6-month window where you can buy any Medicare Supplement plan sold in South Carolina — Plan G, Plan N, any of them — with no health questions asked. After that window closes, carriers in SC can decline you or charge you more based on your health. For a 30-year plant veteran with a knee replacement and a heart stent, that one-time window is worth protecting.

Check your Michelin retirement packet for these three things

Retiree benefits vary by hire date, location, and how your package was structured, so before you make any Medicare move, log into Michelin's Benefit Link portal or call the benefits center and pin down:

1. Is there retiree medical, an HRA, or neither? Many large manufacturers have shifted Medicare-eligible retirees from group retiree plans to a fixed contribution — often a Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA) that reimburses you for premiums on a plan you buy yourself. If Michelin offers you HRA dollars, the rules about which plans qualify for reimbursement (and how you must enroll to get them) matter enormously. Some arrangements require enrolling through a specific exchange to unlock the money.
2. What happens to your spouse? If your spouse is younger than 65 and on your Michelin plan, your retirement may end their coverage too — and they can't join Medicare early. They'll need a bridge plan, and the options look very different at 58 versus 63.
3. Do you have retiree life insurance, and does it shrink? Employer life insurance often reduces or disappears at retirement. If your family still depends on it, the time to replace it is before you retire, while you can still qualify at your healthiest.

What this looks like on a calendar

For a Michelin employee planning to retire at the end of, say, June:

• January–March: Confirm your plan type (HSA?), pull your retirement packet, and get your spouse's situation mapped. Talk to Social Security about whether to file for benefits (that's a separate decision — don't let anyone bundle them).
• April–May: Apply for Part B with a July 1 start date, using Social Security's employment-ends form (your HR signs a piece of it). Compare Medigap vs. Medicare Advantage while your guaranteed-issue window is guaranteed to be open.
• June: Enroll in your supplement or Advantage plan and a Part D drug plan, timed to start the day your Michelin coverage ends. No gap, no penalty, no health questions.

Retiring mid-year, at year-end, or getting a package with bridge coverage? The calendar shifts, but the sequence doesn't.

Where we come in

This is the exact handoff we handle every week. Here's what a free review with us looks like for a Michelin employee or spouse:

• We read your retirement packet with you and translate it — what you actually have (retiree medical, HRA, COBRA offer, bridge coverage), what it's worth, and what the fine print requires of you.
• We build your personal calendar — your Part B application date, your Medigap guaranteed-issue window, your Part D deadline — so nothing starts late and nothing overlaps.
• We compare every option, not one company's. We're independent, so we quote Plan G, Plan N, Medicare Advantage, and drug plans across carriers in South Carolina and show you the math side by side — including whether keeping any Michelin retiree coverage beats replacing it.
• We handle the spouse problem — bridge coverage for a husband or wife who isn't 65 yet, so nobody's left exposed the day your badge stops working.
• It costs you nothing. We're paid by the insurance carriers, the same way whichever plan you pick. You never pay us a fee, and you're never obligated to enroll in anything.

The bottom line

Michelin gives its people solid benefits, and that's exactly why the Medicare handoff trips people up — the better your group coverage, the more moving parts there are when it ends. The rules above aren't Michelin-specific secrets; they're federal Medicare timing rules colliding with a specific employer's paperwork. But that collision is where the expensive mistakes live.

If you or your spouse works at the Lexington plant, Earthmover, or anywhere else in Michelin's South Carolina footprint and retirement is anywhere on the horizon — even two years out — bring us your retirement packet. We're right here in Lexington, we've walked plenty of Midlands manufacturing retirees through this exact handoff, and the review costs you nothing. You'll leave knowing your dates, your options, and what that packet actually says.

Mauldin Insurance Group is an independent insurance agency in Lexington, SC. We are not affiliated with or endorsed by Michelin North America, Medicare, or any government agency. Plan availability and benefits vary; consult your official plan documents for details about your specific coverage.