Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal today:
More Problems Expected on Federal Health-Insurance Site in New Year
Technology gaps in HealthCare.gov are expected to cause consumers and insurers a fresh batch of complications after the site reopens for health-plan enrollment this month, insurance-industry officials say.
Millions of Americans are expected to buy or change plans using the federal portal when the second year of enrollment under the Affordable Care Act begins Nov. 15. But some back-end parts of the system have had problems and others haven’t been built, triggering difficulties that could affect tens of thousands of people when new plans kick in next year.
Consumers who bought policies on the exchange for 2014 and switch to a different insurer for 2015 could end up enrolled in two plans, with bills for both, in January, according to two industry officials. Others who stopped paying premiums for their plans this year could find themselves automatically re-enrolled in those plans for 2015 regardless of whether they want them…
Can somebody please explain again why they thought it was a good idea to turn over 1/6 of the U.S. economy, a very impotant 1/6 that literally affects matters of life-and-death, to a government apparently incapable of building a functioning web site in four years that allows people to purchase health insurance and be accurately billed for that insurance?
Sean Parnell ([email protected]) is a research fellow for health policy at The Heartland Institute.
