2017 Health Insurance Rate Requests

[Salty]

Anyone heard anything regarding 2017 Obamacare rates in Massachusetts?


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[DougViages]

United Healthcare (Golden Rule) N. Carolina - 17% Increase

Right in line with most of the postings. Goes into effect 10/1/2016.

 

[MBSC]

California: Officials in CA approved a 2017 average rate increase of 13.2% for exchange plans.

The state’s two largest insurers, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, will increase their rates even further by 17 percent and 20 percent respectively. Some regions will see even higher premium increases. The steepest rise (28.6 percent) will hit the counties of Monterey, San Benito and Santa Cruz, where limited competition has driven health care costs up even further. Northeast Los Angeles County will see an average uptick of 16.4 percent. San Francisco’s rates are expected to rise by an average of 14.8 percent.

Source: Covered California Announces Double-Digit Rate Increases | California County News

Kentucky: Officials in KY have approved the following rate increases.

In most of the 15 cases before the department this year, the state set rates at or below the hikes requested by insurance companies. For example, Humana Health Plan Inc. requested that it be allowed to increase insurance rates for individuals in Kentucky by 33.7 percent; the DoI approved an increase of 31 percent. Aetna Health Plan Inc. wanted an increase of 7.6 percent; it got approval for 5.6 percent.

However, Baptist Health Plan Inc. requested a rate increase of 26.68 percent, yet the DoI approved a hike of 27.9 percent. And CareSource Kentucky Co. sought an increase of 20.55 percent — and received one of 29.3 percent.

Insurance Commissioner H. Brian Maynard told IL via email that in those cases, the department determined, based on actuarial review, that the request “would be inadequate to meet each company’s obligations to pay claims.”

Source: Insider Louisville: Closing Bell for Aug. 5 | Local News - WLKY Home

Massachusetts: Officials in MA have approved the following rate increases.

The state also announced new rates for 2017 for individuals who sign up for health plans. Those rates are slated to rise 6.7 percent on average across 16 plans, affecting an estimated 268,000 people. Rates for Harvard Pilgrim customers will rise 15 percent, and for Neighborhood Health Plan members nearly 19 percent.

Source: https://www.bostonglobe.com/busines...age-percent/sHRgbzo98ztwhkA81y8IdM/story.html

Vermont: Officials in VT approved a 2017 average rate increase of 7.3% for BCBS-VT, which had requested an 8.2% increase.

The board disregarded much of the testimony from its own actuaries, which largely agreed with Blue Cross’ request to raise prices 8.2 percent.

Source: Vt. Health Insurer Wins Rate Boost

 

[MBSC]

Arkansas: Three insurers will adjust their rate increases to comply with requests from state officials. Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield will increase rates an average of 9.7% instead of the 14.7% originally requested. QualChoice will increase an average of 13.5% instead of the original 23% and Centene will increase an average of 4% instead of the original 8.1% requested.

Source: 3 insurers cut rate-rise requests for state exchange

Maine: Officials in Maine approved the following average rate increases.

The bureau gave the OK to a 25.5 percent increase for customers of Community Health Options, 21.1 percent for Harvard Pilgrim and 18 percent for Anthem. Most of the increases will be offset by subsidies for those who qualify for government assistance.

“I do worry that the rate increases will be a hardship for people making just over the 400 percent,” said Emily Brostek, executive director of Consumers for Affordable Health Care, an Augusta-based health advocacy group. “If they were just barely able to make their payment now, they may not be able to afford it next year.”

A fourth insurer, Aetna, had filed paperwork to join the Maine marketplace, but withdrew last week. Aetna will, however, offer off-marketplace individual plans in Maine in 2017.

Source: Maine Bureau of Insurance approves double-digit ACA rate increases - The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram

Tennessee: Officials in TN approved the following average rate increases.

BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, the state's biggest health insurer, will raise individual rates by 62 percent in 2017. Their small group rates will rise by only 6.5 percent, however.

Cigna got state approval to raise its individual rates for its ObamaCare plans by 46.3 percent, while Humana got the OK for a 44.3 percent jump in premiums for individual plans next year.

Aetna doesn't offer marketplace plans, but its other individual health plans will see a 14.1 percent jump in premiums in 2017. Aetna's rates for small employer groups will rise only 1.6 percent.

State regulators approved a 17.3 percent increase in individual rates for Freedom Life and a 33.86 percent increase in individual rates for TRH Health.

Source: Tennessee approves costly health exchange price hikes for state's biggest insurers | Times Free Press

 

[Chris7]

All of these increases will be okay. We don't have any inflation remember.

If our rates rise as expected, our healthcare costs just for the premiums will be at or near 10% of our gross income.

cd :O)

 

[GTFan]

Holy crap, 62% for BCBS in TN?? And other biggies get 40%+?? How the hell do regulators justify allowing this? Oh yeah, I remember who runs the place now - same anti-consumer regulators we have here in GA.

What an outrage.

 

[pb4uski]

Holy crap, 62% for BCBS in TN?? And other biggies get 40%+?? How the hell do regulators justify allowing this? Oh yeah, I remember who runs the place now - same anti-consumer regulators we have here in GA.

What an outrage.

The saving grace is that if the premium increase is overbaked as you seem to think and they don't pay out 80% of what they collect in premiums in claims then they will need to provide insureds with a refund.

 

[samclem]

The saving grace is that if the premium increase is overbaked as you seem to think and they don't pay out 80% of what they collect in premiums in claims then they will need to provide insureds with a refund.

An interesting setup we've created. The insurer's books need to show an 80% payout to HC providers (to avoid having to refund money to policyholders). But there's no true mechanism to hold down the cost of the care, since the (fewer and fewer remaining) insurers just get higher rates approved by regulators. After all--if they get to keep 20% of the total, then the bigger the total gets, the more money they make. Reducing healthcare costs will ultimately hurt, not help, their bottom line.
The regulators are scared of driving out the remaining insurance companies. As long as "% of premiums spent on care" is the metric, there will be no incentive to improve efficiency, or patient care.
This isn't a "market failure" (though it will surely be portrayed as one) because we don't have a true market. In a true market consumers would have enough information to decide on which insurer offers the best value (to include quality of care, wait times, etc) for the price, and insurers would have incentives reduce costs/improve value, they would have the means to affect the prices they pay, and they would be rewarded for good results. Not many of those traits evident in what we now have (or, to be fair, in what existed before the ACA).

 

[Henry Lili]

I'm just under 10% of income this year. Now it looks like we'll be down to just one insurer in SE PA. United Health and
Aetna both will pull out for 2017.Hmm, with no competition what would you do as CEO as the only game in town.....

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[explanade]

There will never be competitive markets for insurance, hospitals, doctors, drugs.

We see what's happening with drug prices as certain drugs get monopoly status.

Doctors and hospitals have no motive to offer transparent pricing because they have a very lucrative situation. They don't want to have to compete by price.

It's probably going to take a lot of pain and more scandals like Epipen before people make politicians pay for inaction. But a lot of congressmen not only have safe seats but they can take a lot of health care lobby money.

 

[samclem]

There will never be competitive markets for insurance, hospitals, doctors, drugs.

There's no reason markets can't work for this service, but it is different from some other services. There are several routes to go that would make it work, but, from where we are right now, the easiest approach is to provide consumers with high-quality data on quality of care available through various insurers/networks. The government is in the best position to gather that data. Not just general data, but highly specific information based on types of care.

It's probably going to take a lot of pain and more scandals like Epipen before people make politicians pay for inaction.

Playing whack-a-mole with one issue after another isn't going to get the job done. And price caps/controls will only assure scarcity (as they always do). We need to address the fundamental issues that cause the problems.

 

[explanade]

You think you're going to have a competitive market without cooperation from the entities making all this money now?

There's no economic incentive for them to agree to more competition in their business.

 

[samclem]

There's no economic incentive for them to agree to more competition in their business.

Ford doesn't "agree" to allow GM into the marketplace.

 

[GTFan]

Bigtime increases for Georgia next year:

Obamacare insurance to jump by double digits in Georgia next year | www.myajc.com

Alliant, 21 percent

Ambetter (Peach State), 13.7 percent

Blue Cross and Blue Shield, 21.4 percent

Harken Health, 51 percent

Humana, 67.5 percent

Kaiser Permanente, 17.6 percent

I stand by my post above, these are beyond the pale increases that hopefully will result in rebates as pb4uski mentioned above. [Mod Edit]

 

[MichaelB]

I stand by my post above, these are beyond the pale increases that hopefully will result in rebates as pb4uski mentioned above.

These increases are high, and for sure will cause some hardship in Georgia. Still, when we look at the average cost of healthcare insurance in the US, some of these premiums are below average and can increase even more.

The KFF annual survey of employer sponsored healthcare shows that average yearly family premiums for 2015 were $17.5K (source here). The Milliman Index (here) shows that the average total cost for healthcare for a family of 4 was $26K. CMS reports per person personal health care spending for the 65 and older population was $18,988 in 2012.

 

[GTFan]

For sure Harken was underpriced this year, they are a new entrant trying to buy market share. Not surprising to see that increase given all the other data we've seen.

But I have a much harder time swallowing the Humana increase and wonder, as others have, if this is tied to the DoJ's attempt to block their merger with Aetna. I guess we're lucky to still have them as an option given the massive pullout they did overall.

 

[MichaelB]

The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation released some data yesterday, the Miami Herald published this FOIR chart (attached below) http://www.miamiherald.com/latest-n...arket-Monthly-Premiums-for-Plan-Year-2017.pdf
large rate increases, no real surprises. The only large insurer not present is UHC. Humana, Aetna and Cigna continue - not a surprise given that Florida is the nation's largest individual health care market with more than 2M QHPs in 2016. We don't know if they will cover the entire state or just the more populous counties (probably the latter). Herald article here

 

[NW-Bound]

I tried to tell you not to move here...

Yes, but you mentioned heat and scorpions and chiggers and all that stuff. Not insurance!

+1

Not in Texas and not contemplating moving there, but I can see how one is not afraid if he has health care to take care of heat strokes and venomous insect bites. We cannot all be as tough as Davy Crockett.

 

[MBSC]

(snip) The only large insurer not present is UHC. Humana, Aetna and Cigna continue - not a surprise given that Florida is the nation's largest individual health care market with more than 2M QHPs in 2016. We don't know if they will cover the entire state or just the more populous counties (probably the latter).

Here is a list of 2017 insurers in each FL county. http://www.floir.com/sitedocuments/IndividualMarketPlanDistributionbyCounty.pdf

 

[MichaelB]

Here is a list of 2017 insurers in each FL county. http://www.floir.com/sitedocuments/IndividualMarketPlanDistributionbyCounty.pdf

Looks like I will be with BCBS once again.

 

[GTFan]

Yep, the so-called #1 best place to retire in the other thread here, Crestview/Destin/Ft. Walton, has exactly one insurer either on or off-exchange - BCBS. And it's not exactly rural.

 

[MBSC]

For sure Harken was underpriced this year, they are a new entrant trying to buy market share. Not surprising to see that increase given all the other data we've seen.

Harken has announced they will only sell off-exchange plans in Georgia and Chicago in 2017.

Harken will not offer individual plans through Obamacare exchanges in Georgia and Chicago in 2017, the company said Thursday in an e-mailed statement. It will continue to offer individual plans off the exchange, Harken said.
Harken has canceled its plans to enter the Florida marketplace for 2017.

Reference: Harken Exits Obamacare Markets as UnitedHealth Startup Struggles - Bloomberg

 

[ShokWaveRider]

BCBS AKA Florida Blue (I think) pretty much owns the Florida Health insurance Market. It "may" not be such a bad thing as Florida could maintain a "group" rate as a result, well perhaps...

 

[GTFan]

Harken has announced they will only sell off-exchange plans in Georgia and Chicago in 2017.

Oh crap, that was our backup plan for our current HC providers if Humana goes away (we got a notice from them yesterday that they were discontinuing our ACA plan). Now we may have no one in-network for WellStar, the largest provider network in our area.

Looks like we may end up having to switch to Kaiser and getting new docs. This sucks, but at least we'll still have a choice.

 

[bizlady]

Minnesota Individual Health Insurance Policies - 2017 Average Rate Changes
Blue Plus 55.00%
Group Health 53.00%
HealthPartners 50.00%
Medica Ins Co 57.50%
Medica Health Plans of WI 59.40%
PreferredOne 63.00%
Ucare 66.80%

BCBS pulled out of market- all wanted to pull out and the state got them to stay by approving large increases. Who knows what 2018 will bring....

source: http://mn.gov/commerce-stat/pdfs/rate-release-packet-2017.pdf