During an exit interview as I was going to a new job, they let me know my coverage was good until the end of the month.

Me, never able to not say something stupid, "Got it. Don't get hit by a bus on the 1st."

Dead silence. HR playing ping-pong with their eyes. They eventually told me something like that had happened to a person who'd just left a few months prior to this.

One of these days, I'll learn, yeah?

Their discomfort at being reminded of the real world consequences of their actions doesn't make what you said stupid.

COBRA can be effective (or is inherently) as of the term date so you have continuous coverage. That said, it’s expensive AF

It seems like it’s become a bit more common for companies to pay part or all of the COBRA premiums for a period after a separation, at least that’s been the case in my last two job losses (one company paid the company part of the premium for six months, the other paid the whole premium for three).

You must have worked at great companies. Lately, I’m personally aware of several companies having just fired large numbers “for performance reasons” despite folks having never been told of such “performance issues” and with no severance or health coverage for any amount of time despite over a decade’s worth of tenure and history of excellent performance.

It's expensive in the sense that you now have to pay what your former employer paid (well, 2 or 3 percent more), when often the employer was paying most or all of it for you. After my COBRA ran out a month ago I found that the ACA plans available to me at the same price were a huge downgrade in benefits.

How is it useless? It's exactly the same as the plan you were on at your company.

(Source: was on COBRA for the past 18 months, was annoyed that it ran out. Equivalent plans on my ACA exchange cost significantly more.)

I am working on a tinymush equivalent server in C#. I'm nearly at version 4 compliance.