Thursday, July 31, 2014

ObamaMESS: 2015 Health Policy Renewals may bring Surprise Jump in Rates

If you have health insurance on your job, you probably don’t give much thought to each year’s renewal. But make the same assumption in one of the new health law plans, and it could lead to costly surprises.
Insurance exchange customers who opt for convenience by automatically renewing their coverage for 2015 are likely to receive dated and inaccurate financial aid amounts from the government, say industry officials, advocates, and health care observers.
If those amounts are too low, consumers could get sticker shock over their new premiums. Too high, and they’ll owe taxes later.
Automatic renewal was supposed to make the next open enrollment under President Obama’s health care overhaul smooth for consumers.
But unless the administration changes its 2015 approach, ‘‘they’re setting people up for large and avoidable premium increases,’’ said researcher Caroline Pearson, who follows the health law for the market analysis firm Avalere Health.
It could be a new twist on an old public relations headache for the White House: You keep the health plan you like but get billed way more.
‘It was our preference for [the administration] to have the capacity to update people’s subsidy information, but they haven’t been able to get that built,’’ said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for the industry trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans.
Read the rest of the story HERE.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Go Mitt2016!