No, the insurance companies won’t have to offer them - they will just leave the market.
I don’t think it matters to the insurance companies what they weren’t paid for that they were promised - just that they weren’t paid what was owed them under the law.
The government can’t force any private insurance company to write insurance for anyone.
There also can’t be people who believe the insurance companies are going to agree to being a part of any new plan where they are going to lose money.
I see them bailing as soon as the funding mechanisms for ACA is repealed.
I ran into problems signing up on the marketplace. S is a dependent for tax purposes, but is covered in the school plan. Never saw where I could take him off our application for insurance next year. Ugh. Also can’t tell if insuring 22 yr old on a separate policy is better or the same as having her with us in our policy. I heard that if income is under something around 25k, that even if the marketplace shows a plan, she might be kicked into Medicaid. Our premium is going from 1100 to 1700 approx. if we cover 2 mid 50s, a teen and a 20 for same plan as 2016.
psychmomma, is your 22 yo daughter your dependent? If she is not, and her income is something like $25K, she is nowhere near the Medicaid threshold. (The cutoff is $11,880.) But she is entitled to subsidies on her premium, as well as a lower deductible and lowered copays. If she is not your dependent, she should get her own insurance. It will be cheaper.
If she is your dependent, she is not eligible for subsidies if your family isn’t eligible. You still might want to put her on her own insurance-- if she is healthy, you might want to put her on a cheaper plan than yours. If you want her on the same plan you are on, you might as well include her in your policy. The premium will be the same, but your family deductible might be lower.
About the issue of removing your son from your insurance plan-- he is legally required to have insurance, but he is not required to have two insurances. Did you try to call up the help line or use the online help service, to get him off your application?
Everything in our application is a question mark. Lol. Self employed income, fluctuates wildly, job loss coming in March, not sure if D will be dependent in 2017, etc. funny how I don’t procrastinate in most of my life, but on this I am running out the clock. I haven’t called yet, but will probably need to do it.
^ I will. We’re auto-enrolled in what we have now so we won’t be without for January. It’s just a matter of predicting income, which sets our subsidy level, and deciding how to deal with the other questions.
I just signed up today as we learned in October that our current insurance company was pulling out of our state. I’ve spent the past week researching all possible options. I am most upset that we can no longer purchase a PPO plan. Everything appears to be in narrow networks. The available hospitals are a complete joke for most of the plans. We have 3 good hospitals within 15 miles of our home, and none of these hospitals are included in most of the plans. I am also still very upset about the fact that for 2016 the top 3 hospitals in our area, which are nationally known for cancer treatment, were excluded from all plans. Honestly, as upset as I am about the outrageous premiums, I am more upset about being denied coverage from the top hospitals in our area. I have 2 autoimmune illness, and my one specialist is not in network as a result of these changes. My DH is a small business owner. He does not offer small group coverage as his employees are all covered by their spouses’ plans and don’t want to pay for insurance. The insurance companies in our area will no longer offer traditional PPO plans to companies that employ less than 150 people for 2017. I am beyond frustrated to be paying $1500/month for an HMO that only includes 4 hospitals.
I hear you. The reason I started this thread was the same frustration you are expressing. On of my kids lives in Phoenix. There is ONE choice of a vendor…Healthnet…in Phoenix. HMO plans only. While @ucbalumnus found a bunch of PCPs on a list for these plans, the reality is my son has NOT been able to find one who is taking patients…with this insurance plan. Hospitals are limited too. I haven’t checked that…
So for my kid…he gets a physical once a year IF he can find a doctor who will do it. Last year, he could t find one. When he got sick…he went to the Minute clinic. They take his ACA plan…for now at least.
And he gets RX coverage…which my kid happens to need.
Second kid has NO…read that $0 income and is not in an expansion state. Insurance went from $275 a month to $375 a month. Oh well…it’s a POS (you can take those letters any way you choose) so she does have decent coverage…and also OOS coverage in the Anthem network…which for her is important.
But at least they both have health insurance for 2017.
My apologies on my link. I was trying to be apolitical. The name misspelling is the result of a browser extension and was truly an accident. I’m usually good about going back and correcting that when I post.
Exchange enrollments are surging right now, according to CNN. It can help explain if people are experiencing technical glitches around now that people weren’t experiencing even a few days ago (like when I signed my roommate up).
A lot of people may be signing up now out of a genuine fear or belief that the law could be changed to prevent new enrollments, but allow existing policies and enrollments to continue. I think as a matter of policy that would not be a workable plan – but keep in mind that when ACA first came in, there was a provision allowing already-insured people to stay on grandfathered plans for awhile. So it is at least a plausible scenario that Congress would create some sort of transition plan that would have a different set of provisions for people who were enrolled in ACA prior to Jan 15, 2017 vs. people buying insurance in a post-ACA world.
One of the big flaws in the individual mandate was that anyone could sign up any time, outside of open enrollment periods, with a change of circumstance – and the changes were things that people had the ability to create for themselves if necessary (moving to a different coverage area, loss of a job, marriage, etc.) Now there is very real risk that it may not be able to sign up in the future – but even Republican leaders who have been beating the drums for repeal for years are saying that they don’t want to kick people off the insurance they already have.
@calmom, my D moved from IN to WA state in June 2014, and immediately got insurance through the WA exchange under the change of circumstances provision of ACA . She had to provide documentation that she had been covered in IN, as well as proof of residence in WA. Her IN insurance would have done her no good at all in WA, except (possibly) for ER care. I don’t think you’re saying she should have had to go bare for the last 6 months of 2014, are you?
So, LasMa, you’re saying that if your daughter had been uninsured in Indiana, then moved to WA in June, they wouldn’t have let her buy insurance because she didn’t have insurance that year? She would have had to wait for January?
Calmom (and me, too) object to people living in one state, not getting insurance, then getting diagnosed with a serious disease and moving to another state just so they have a qualifying exemption and can buy insurance mid-year. This would be a particular problem in a small Eastern state: someone in Brooklyn could easily move across the Hudson to Hoboken after being diagnosed with cancer, without changing jobs and without too much disruption. But if she had had to have insurance in Brooklyn, the strategy wouldn’t have worked. This is the first I’ve heard of insurers in the new state requiring prior insurance in the old state.
“So, LasMa, you’re saying that if your daughter had been uninsured in Indiana, then moved to WA in June, they wouldn’t have let her buy insurance because she didn’t have insurance that year? She would have had to wait for January?”
Iirc, it’s not the loss of a job or change of a job that is a qualifying event - it’s the loss of insurance provided by that job that is the qualifying event. I believe if you don’t have insurance prior to your move - the move alone isnt a qualifying event. It the loss of insurance. I think it has been this way from the get go. One wouid have to wait for open enrollment period to get insured.
I see. So according to that site you can buy insurance midyear if you move to a new area that your current insurance doesn’t cover, or if you were on Medicaid in the old state and the new state is not an expansion state. Or for a variety of other reasons. But not if you didn’t have insurance in your old state and now you feel like getting it in your new state.
It’s not as easy as people think to get insurance after open enrollment if you haven’t had it before. But most people don’t understand that and believe they can just wait until they get sick and need it.