Grand Junction · Helping a parent whose plan is ending

Can I Enroll My Parent in a Medicare Plan for 2027?

The letter came to your mother in Fruita. It says her Medicare Advantage plan will not be offered in 2027, and she has handed it to you. Whether you can sign her up for something new turns on one federal definition and three Colorado statutes, not on the fact that you are her daughter. Here is what counts as authority, what does not, and how the 2027 calendar runs for both of you.

Medicare On Main Data Desk

Published September 25, 2026 · 10 min read · Reviewed by Brian Penner, 22+ years in Medicare

Here is the situation I see most in October. A daughter in Grand Junction calls about her mother's plan. The mother is 84, sharp on a good day and not on others, and the daughter has been paying the bills for two years. She has the Medicare card, the login, and the letter. What she may not have is the authority to sign, and the difference matters, because "An individual not authorized by State law makes an enrollment request on another's behalf" is on CMS's list of enrollments that are not legally valid. This article is the answer I give her, with the citations, so you can check it against your own family's paperwork before Open Enrollment opens.

What the federal rule says

The rule is one paragraph, 42 CFR § 422.60(i): "an authorized representative is an individual who is the legal representative or otherwise legally able to act on behalf of an enrollee, as the law of the State in which the beneficiary resides may allow, in order to execute an enrollment or disenrollment request." Two things follow. First, the representative "would constitute the 'beneficiary' or the 'enrollee' for the purpose of making an election," which means your signature is your parent's signature in the plan's eyes. Second, the rule hands the question to the state: CMS lists three kinds of people who "may" qualify, "court-appointed legal guardians, persons having durable power of attorney for health care decisions, or individuals authorized to make health care decisions under state surrogate consent laws," but Colorado law decides whether you are one of them.

CMS's CY 2027 Enrollment and Disenrollment Guidance, the manual every Medicare Advantage and Part D plan follows this fall, spells out what happens at the moment of enrollment. Section 50.1 says that when someone other than the beneficiary completes the request, they must do three things:

Source: CMS: Medicare Advantage and Part D Enrollment and Disenrollment Guidance for CY 2027 (Aug. 25, 2026), §§ 40.2 and 50.1. Section 40.2 adds that the representative must confirm "a copy of the proof of court-appointed legal guardian, durable power of attorney, or proof of other authorization required by State law ... is available and can be presented upon request by the plan or CMS."

Note what CMS does not require: it does not ask you to mail the power of attorney with the application. It asks you to attest, and to have the document ready. That is a lower bar at the moment of enrollment and a higher one if anyone later questions it, which is why the document, not the attestation, is the thing to get right first.

The Colorado documents, and what each one does

Because the rule defers to state law, the useful question in Mesa County is which Colorado instruments carry the authority. This is the list I work from. The middle column is the only one most families need.

Sources: 42 CFR § 422.60(i); CMS CY 2027 guidance § 50.1; C.R.S. § 15-14-506, § 15-14-505, § 15-14-737, § 15-14-704, § 15-14-301, § 15-18.5-104; Medicare.gov, Other forms; Form CMS-1696. This is a description of the statutes, not legal advice; an elder-law attorney can read your parent's actual document.

The medical durable power of attorney

This is the document most Grand Junction families already have, usually in the same folder as the will and the living will, and it is the one CMS names second. C.R.S. § 15-14-506 lets an agent act "in consenting to or refusing medical treatment," which by itself sounds like hospital decisions, not insurance. The reach comes from the definitions section, § 15-14-505(4.7): a "health-care benefit decision" is "any decision or action related to the application, enrollment, disenrollment, appeal, or other function necessary for private or public health-care benefits that does not conflict with any known preference of the individual." Enrollment is in the statute by name. So is the limit: a decision that conflicts with a preference your mother has expressed is outside the agent's authority, which is one more reason to talk with her about the plan, not just for her.

Two checks on the document itself. Read whether it takes effect immediately or only on incapacity; a "springing" power may need a physician's letter before the plan will honor it. And read whether it is durable. Under § 15-14-704, a Colorado power of attorney signed on or after January 1, 2010 "is durable unless it expressly provides that it is terminated by the incapacity of the principal," so a newer document survives a dementia diagnosis by default. One signed before 2010 has to say so.

The general power of attorney

Many affluent households have a broader financial power of attorney, drafted for accounts and real estate, and the question is whether it reaches Medicare. Colorado's answer is in § 15-14-737. If the document grants "general authority with respect to benefits from governmental programs," a phrase the statute defines to include "social security, medicare, and medicaid," then the agent may "enroll in, apply for, select, reject, change, amend, or discontinue, on the principal's behalf, a benefit or program." That is a Medicare Advantage election, described in the statute's own words. The caution is that CMS's three examples are the medical power, the guardian and the surrogate, and § 422.60(i) says representatives "may include" those, not "must be." A financial power that recites the governmental-benefits authority is authority "as the law of the State ... may allow," and in my experience plans accept it, but the enrollment desk at the plan is the one that has to agree. Call the plan in October, before you need the answer in December.

The surrogate: when there is no document at all

This is the case families dread and Colorado handles better than most states. If your father never signed a power of attorney and can no longer decide, you do not need a guardianship to get him a 2027 plan. Under C.R.S. § 15-18.5-104, a proxy chosen under the medical-treatment statute "shall have authority to make health-care benefit decisions on behalf of an adult patient," and "may be known additionally as a surrogate decision-maker for health-care benefits." The sequence is set out in the statute. The attending physician (or a nurse practitioner collaborating with one) determines that he "lacks the decisional capacity to make health-care benefit decisions," with findings on "the cause, nature, and projected duration," documented in the medical record. The physician's office then locates the "interested persons," defined as "the patient's spouse; either parent of the patient; any adult child, sibling, or grandchild of the patient; or any close friend of the patient," who choose one of their number, and the physician "shall certify the appointment in writing" on the statutory form in § 15-18.5-105. That certificate is the proof CMS's guidance asks you to have ready. The statute even anticipates this use: "The division of insurance ... shall be available to provide assistance to surrogate decision-makers for health-care benefits regarding medicare benefits."

A guardianship under § 15-14-301 is the other route, and the one CMS lists first. It is a court appointment, it takes time, and it is the right answer when there is conflict in the family or an estate to protect. For the narrow problem of a plan ending on December 31, the surrogate certificate is usually faster.

The three forms that look like authority and are not

Every October someone shows me a Medicare form and says "I already have permission." Usually it is one of these.

CMS-10106, Authorization to Disclose Personal Health Information. Medicare.gov describes its purpose as "Giving Medicare permission to talk to someone you choose about your claims and health records, if you can't." The form itself says why it exists: "By law, you must give 1-800-MEDICARE permission in writing before 1-800-MEDICARE can share any information with someone other than you." It is worth filing, because without it 1-800-MEDICARE will not discuss your mother's claims with you. It authorizes conversation, not enrollment.

CMS-1696, Appointment of Representative. The form is for appointing someone "to act on your behalf for your claim, appeal, grievance or request." If a 2027 plan denies a prior authorization in February, this is the form that lets you fight it. It does not let you pick the plan.

Social Security representative payee. If SSA sends your father's benefit to you to manage, you are a rep payee. CMS's guidance addresses this directly: plans that know a beneficiary has a payee "should contact the representative payee to determine their legal relationship to the individual," and "Representative payee status alone is not sufficient to enroll an individual." The check and the coverage are two different authorities.

If your parent can still decide: they enroll, you help

Most of the calls I get are not about incapacity. They are about a parent who understands the choice perfectly well and does not want to spend an afternoon on hold. For that family the rule is simple and the guidance says it plainly. On a telephone enrollment, "All elements of the enrollment request must be provided solely by the applicant or their authorized representative, though they may receive assistance from a family member, friend, etc." Your mother has to be on the call, "agree to be recorded and verbally attest to their intent to enroll." You can have the plan names, the doctor list and the prescription list in front of you and feed her every answer. On paper, she signs and you fill in the rest. Online, the guidance treats "a clear and distinct step" such as an "Enroll Now" button as her signature, so she should be the one who clicks it.

What you should not do is enroll her yourself using her Medicare.gov account or her Medicare number, on the theory that she would have agreed. Section 50.6 of the guidance, "Enrollment not Legally Valid," lists two cases that fit: "An individual not authorized by State law makes an enrollment request on another's behalf," and "The individual or their authorized representative did not intend to enroll in the plan," with "An enrollment request signed by the individual when an authorized representative should have signed for the individual" given as evidence of the second. An enrollment found invalid in February leaves her exactly where the do-nothing default leaves her, which we priced in the January 1 post: Original Medicare, no drug plan, no yearly limit.

The 2027 calendar for a parent whose plan is ending

None of the dates change because a representative is involved. They matter more, because a representative is usually working around a job and a drive to Delta or Montrose.

Sources: 42 CFR § 422.506; 42 CFR § 422.111(d)(2); Medicare.gov, Special Enrollment Periods. The Special Enrollment Period's effective dates and the January 1 default are worked through in our first-steps post.

The Mesa County scale of this is not small. CMS's monthly enrollment file for June 2026 counts 41,709 Medicare beneficiaries in the county, 22,554 in Original Medicare and 19,155, about 46%, in Medicare Advantage and other health plans. Every one of the 19,155 got or will get an Annual Notice of Change by September 30, and the ones whose plan is not continuing got a non-renewal letter at least 90 days before December 31. The letter post explains how to tell which one arrived. If you are the family member reading it for someone else, start with that, because a plan that is merely changing its benefits carries no Special Enrollment Period and no January 1 cliff.

The checks are the same; the checker is you

Once the authority is settled, the work is the same review every reader of this series runs, and it has to be done from your parent's records rather than your own memory of them. Their cardiologist at St. Mary's and their primary care in Fruita, searched by name in each 2027 directory, not the carrier's logo, per the doctor post. Their prescriptions by drug, dose and pharmacy against each 2027 formulary, per the drug post. And the Medigap question, which for a parent leaving a discontinued plan is a real one: the plan's departure opens a guaranteed-issue window into Plans A, B, D, G, K or L with no health questions, for a limited time, and the same authority that lets you enroll them in a Medicare Advantage plan is what an insurer will want to see on a Medigap application. That window, its 63-day clock and its "only if you switch to Original Medicare" condition are in the Medigap post. For a parent who has stopped driving to Grand Junction for specialists, or who is in and out of the hospital, the network-free option deserves the comparison.

Health in Mesa County argues for doing this carefully: 26.6% of adults live with high blood pressure, 8.1% with diabetes and 5.2% with coronary heart disease, per CDC PLACES, and those are the conditions whose drug tiers and specialist networks vary most between plans. A parent with two of the three is not a candidate for the plan with the nicest mailer.

What I would do

This week, before October 1, find the document. If it is a medical durable power of attorney or a general power with the governmental-benefits language, read the effective-date clause and the durability clause and put a copy in the folder with the Medicare card. If there is none and your parent can still sign, an attorney can draft one in an afternoon, and it will be worth far more than this one enrollment. If there is none and they cannot sign, call their physician's office now about a capacity finding and the surrogate certificate, because December is not the month to start that. File the CMS-10106 in any case; you will want 1-800-MEDICARE to talk to you. Then, on October 1, run the doctor and drug checks from their records, and, if they can decide, make the call with them rather than for them. Sign as agent, guardian or surrogate, never as your parent, and keep the confirmation number.

How we know all this: the Medicare On Main Data Desk frames every article with public data — here, 42 CFR § 422.60(i) for the definition of an authorized representative and its three examples, quoted as published; the CMS Medicare Advantage and Part D Enrollment and Disenrollment Guidance for CY 2027 (August 25, 2026), §§ 40.2 and 50.1, for the attestation, signature, relationship and contact-information requirements, the representative-payee rule, the family-assistance and recorded-call rules, and § 50.6's list of enrollments that are not legally valid, quoted as published; C.R.S. §§ 15-14-301, 15-14-505(4.7), 15-14-506, 15-14-704, 15-14-737 and 15-18.5-103 to -105 for the Colorado authorities, quoted as published; Medicare.gov's forms page and Forms CMS-10106 and CMS-1696 for what those forms authorize; 42 CFR §§ 422.111(d)(2) and 422.506 and Medicare.gov's Special Enrollment Period page for the 2027 dates; the CMS Medicare Monthly Enrollment file for Mesa County's June 2026 counts; and CDC PLACES county data (2023). The daughter and mother in the opening are a composite, not a client. This is education, not legal advice; whether a particular document carries authority is a question for the plan and, where it matters, an elder-law attorney. No carrier is endorsed or criticized; a plan's non-renewal is a filing fact, not a judgment. Confirm plans, costs and eligibility with a licensed agent or Medicare.gov. We take no payment from any carrier to feature a plan.