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Obamacare enrollments got off to very slow start, documents show [video]

3 points by grej 13y ago

hga 13y ago
I wonder if those figures are based on a round trip from the insurers, because it's official per the fix-it czar that their getting bad 834 EDI transactions is the site's #1 problem. The "Experian doing a credit check" has popped up again. What gives? "Direct enrollment (signing up directly on an insurer's website) is not working for any issuers." I wonder exactly what this means. We know the federal site is intertwingled with the state ones, but I think we would have heard if nobody was able to sign up for Obamacare compliant insurance, especially with the millions who have gotten and are getting notice their old coverage was not grandfathered.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > "Direct enrollment (signing up directly on an insurer's website) is not working for any issuers." > I wonder exactly what this means. Probably exactly what it says: for the plans available through the federally-run exchanges (the ones that the federal site serves), enrollment through the insurer's own sites (which presumably still includes links back to the exchange) were not working. > We know the federal site is intertwingled with the state ones The federal site serves only the states that didn't set up their own exchanges (for the states that did set up their exchanges, the marketplace just redirects to the state site, they aren't "intertwingled" any more than by a hyperlink.)
  - hga 13y ago
    We know for an absolute fact that if the Federal system is off-line, as happened when Verizon recently goofed, the state exchanges can't function. In addition to who knows what else, the Federal system is the only one allowed to do subsidy calculations, which makes sense because if a policy is bought with them, that results in a draw on the Federal fisc. So the state exchanges use it for that purpose, and in theory someday insurers will be able to use it so you can buy directly from them and take advantage of any subsidy due you (that's obviously a very low priority for the Federal site).
super-serial 13y ago
I haven't had health insurance for about 7 years now. The only way I would ever get health insurance was if the fee for not complying was greater than the cost of paying for insurance. Even then the worst they could do is take the fee out of my tax refund. The refund is far in the future... whereas right now I need money to pay bills, so why would I pay anything for insurance now? I'll just let them take my refund. I'm sure other part-timers will think similarly.

3 points by grej 13y ago

hga 13y ago

I wonder if those figures are based on a round trip from the insurers, because it's official per the fix-it czar that their getting bad 834 EDI transactions is the site's #1 problem. The "Experian doing a credit check" has popped up again. What gives? "Direct enrollment (signing up directly on an insurer's website) is not working for any issuers." I wonder exactly what this means. We know the federal site is intertwingled with the state ones, but I think we would have heard if nobody was able to sign up for Obamacare compliant insurance, especially with the millions who have gotten and are getting notice their old coverage was not grandfathered.

dragonwriter 13y ago
> "Direct enrollment (signing up directly on an insurer's website) is not working for any issuers." > I wonder exactly what this means. Probably exactly what it says: for the plans available through the federally-run exchanges (the ones that the federal site serves), enrollment through the insurer's own sites (which presumably still includes links back to the exchange) were not working. > We know the federal site is intertwingled with the state ones The federal site serves only the states that didn't set up their own exchanges (for the states that did set up their exchanges, the marketplace just redirects to the state site, they aren't "intertwingled" any more than by a hyperlink.)
- hga 13y ago
  We know for an absolute fact that if the Federal system is off-line, as happened when Verizon recently goofed, the state exchanges can't function. In addition to who knows what else, the Federal system is the only one allowed to do subsidy calculations, which makes sense because if a policy is bought with them, that results in a draw on the Federal fisc. So the state exchanges use it for that purpose, and in theory someday insurers will be able to use it so you can buy directly from them and take advantage of any subsidy due you (that's obviously a very low priority for the Federal site).

super-serial 13y ago

I haven't had health insurance for about 7 years now. The only way I would ever get health insurance was if the fee for not complying was greater than the cost of paying for insurance. Even then the worst they could do is take the fee out of my tax refund. The refund is far in the future... whereas right now I need money to pay bills, so why would I pay anything for insurance now? I'll just let them take my refund. I'm sure other part-timers will think similarly.