I'd like to cancel my health insurance and my employer is stating that to do so I must have a qualifying event. Now I've heard of having a qualifying event if I wanted to enroll during a period other than open enrollment but never to terminate coverage.

You MUST have a spouse that became elligible for coverage at a different employer and you WILL have to provide proof it has been signed up for before they will allow it. But they aren't going to allow you to simply drop coverage mid year.

Strange, I contacted my insurance company (twice ) and was told I could terminate at anytime. Thanks

Its Federal law they are all contrained by. you can't come and go as you want easily and they can't change plans or prices mid year either.... they must have had a N00b answering the phones... 7 employers and 33 years working since college... and I have had to make switches mid year before several times so I've been down this road a couple times personally. Because my open enrolement period was 4 months different than my wife's open enrolement period. There was no possible way to switch during both of our open enrollment periods. Going either direction resulted in a mid year change.

Thanks.

You can drop your coverage during your next open enrollment... until then you can only move to a spouses plan, but not simply drop it mid-year.

I agree, with work plans, normally can not just cancel plan.