ACA Federal Marketplace updates

Your ACA posts are the ones I read a little more closely than others, so please don't stop writing them. I like that you fairly reflect on the overall situation, integrating the latest information, and then add how that affects your situation and your current thinking.

I second, we happen to live in the same state and I follow your posts. I think you had said earlier you expect your rates to increase. I'm in a different situation with my pre existing conditions, I'll be able to insure my whole body. But I really want to see a real number.

MRG
 
Fehb bcbs

Hi everyone just registered today. My question is about my federal retiree health insurance. I plan to retire in June 2014. I will be relocating to NH. I currently have Federal employees BCBS. When I retire I plan to carry BCBS into retirement but was reading an article that noted Anthem BCBS in NH will only have 14 hospitals in its network beginning in January eliminating 26 other hospitals one of which is close to my home. What does this mean? The article is as follows:
CONCORD — Starting in January, nearly half of New Hampshire's 26 hospitals, including Portsmouth Regional Hospital, won't serve patients who get individual health insurance through Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield.
Anthem will be the only company providing individual health insurance plans through the new marketplaces required under the federal Affordable Care Act. The Telegraph of Nashua reports that Anthem will use a "narrower network" of 14 hospitals for customers with individual plans whether or not they purchase plans through the marketplace. Anthem officials described their plans Wednesday at a meeting of the Legislature's Health Reform Oversight Committee.
Critics say the change will force many people to travel farther to get to a hospital or doctor's office.
Hospitals not in the network include Concord Hospital and Androscoggin Valley Regional Hospital in Berlin, as well as Portsmouth Regional and others.

My hospital of choice and doctor would be the Concord Hospital and Concord area. Will this affect my federal BCBS or just the ACA exchanges that will offer BCBS?
 
Welcome Gary7ven. I think your questions would best be answered by BCBS. No harm in calling the BCBS 800 number and posing as a NH retiree with questions.

The only encouraging thing I can say is that we've seen states where different exchange plans posted by a given insurance company have varying networks. Plan A has network A, plan B has network B. So it seems to me it is not a certainty that your BCBS group plan's network will be identical to an individual BCBS plan's network.
 
KFF just posted another detailed assessment of projected HI premiums for 18 large cites. Huge (~45%) variation in rates from 390 in NYC to 697 in Hartford, CT (full mo prem 2nd lowest Silver plan for 60yo non-smoker). Unfortunately my metro are may see among the HIGHEST rates for typical ER's. I hope this analysis proves wrong when actual rates are known in a few weeks, but for some of us it appears the large ACA-related increases some predicted may indeed happen. In my case this KFF prediction would be nearly double my 2013 COBRA :(

An Early Look at Premiums and Insurer Participation in Health Insurance Marketplaces, 2014 | The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation
 
KFF just posted another detailed assessment of projected HI premiums for 18 large cites. Huge (~45%) variation in rates from 390 in NYC to 697 in Hartford, CT (full mo prem 2nd lowest Silver plan for 60yo non-smoker). Unfortunately my metro are may see among the HIGHEST rates for typical ER's. I hope this analysis proves wrong when actual rates are known in a few weeks, but for some of us it appears the large ACA-related increases some predicted may indeed happen. In my case this KFF prediction would be nearly double my 2013 COBRA :(

An Early Look at Premiums and Insurer Participation in Health Insurance Marketplaces, 2014 | The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation

I wonder ultimately this first year price discrepancy is more about in certain places companies getting their rate requests cut, or willingness to be loss leaders to get a foothold in the system. It will be interesting to see what happens the second and third year in relation to pricing points. That scares me even more than the first year projected rates.
 
Isn't red-lining by zip code illegal for car insurance?

Though I guess it comes down to competition in a given market and insurers trying to cherry-pick some desirable demographic.

Still, shouldn't the comparison be more to individual plans that was offered (if any) under the previous system than compare it to COBRA or group plans?
 
It's starting to look like the federal exchange will be the very last one to start posting rates. They probably won't even do that until October 1, and that assumes they are ready by then.
 
It's starting to look like the federal exchange will be the very last one to start posting rates. They probably won't even do that until October 1, and that assumes they are ready by then.

Since many seem to be ex-IT, any wagers for the first federal exchange outage? Maybe a poll? Doesn't belong in this thread.

MRG
 
I live in a co-op apartment building. We are currently paying 100% of our 5 full time employees hi. The only Fed taxes we pay are eer SS & Medicare. Can tax credits under ACA be used to offset those?
 
Time will tell how well the system works and how vulnerable it is to hacking. Personally I'm very glad I do not have to sign up during 1st yr roll-out of ANY gov't program, especially one this complex.

You will also be able to purchase off exchange through insurance providers website or ehealthinsurance instead of the exchange provided you are not needing to access a subsidy. At my present understanding, I imagine I will be purchasing off exchange. Not for security reasons, but for increased options that will not be on the exchange. Especially if there is not an HSA available on exchange through my state.
 
Iowa is one of the states where the feds will run the exchange.

Their state officials are ready to release rate information, perhaps without waiting for the opening of the exchange on the 1st.

Sure wish my state would.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/ar...sey=tab|topnews|text|Frontpage&nclick_check=1

Health Insurance Marketplace Participating Insurers Confirm Their Commitments | Iowa Insurance Division

A recent national publication comparing seventeen states who have published rates so far uses the second lowest “Silver” plan, which meets a medium set of standards to be met for coverage offered in the marketplace, as a comparative standard. While prices vary across Iowa’s seven geographic pricing regions, central Iowa’s second-lowest monthly premium for the silver level plan rate for a 40-year-old non-smoker is $219.69. Only two of the states in that national report listed lower rates on this measure than Iowa’s.
Iowa will be one of relatively few states that have explicitly announced a tobacco use surcharge.

Factors of age, location and smoker status will result in differences in rates for Iowans. For instance, the 40-year-old smoker’s monthly rate for the silver plan would be $329.32 instead of $219.69.
 
Wow, that's $1200 more a year on top of what the cigarettes cost.

Expensive habit.
 
explanade said:
Wow, that's $1200 more a year on top of what the cigarettes cost.

Expensive habit.

That would be tough to prove unless the government tested monthly, used expensive hair sampling or used random testing. And then if one was caught, what would be the worst that could happen?
 
Well has Orwell ever been wrong:)?

MRG
 
I suspect any significant amount of lying about smoking would be used as rationalization for restructuring health insurance applications to contain a smoke-free discount instead of a smoking surcharge, thereby requiring all of us to subject ourselves to some medical test to prove we're not a smoker, if we want to get the discount, meaning the discount would would be eaten up, at least in part, by the fee for the medical test and the cost of our time to do it every year or two or three. Then there would be the black market for the testing, so the group would pay the added freight of a non-smoking discount given to a smoker, with an unscrupulous lab benefiting on the side.

None of this is really unusual - it's basically the way other things work. There's a discount for folks who drive short distances to work, but people lie. The insurance pool the liar is in pays the added freight for the higher risk. Auto insurance also generally requires cars are in safe operating condition, but in the past there were unscrupulous mechanics in states where the inspections are done by private mechanics who took money to pass a car that failed the tests. It actually ends up with various new costs, associated with the individuals who would engage in such unscrupulous practices, being laid on everyone. Our state's inspection system now has inspectors who inspect the inspectors. The testing machines are certified and sealed, and test results are strictly electronic and encoded, so that they cannot be fudged, adding a bit more cost for everyone.

So like all honor systems, there's probably going to be a cost to everyone associated with those who won't engage the system with honor.
 
they are saying a smoker surcharge but what it really means is anyone who uses tobacco. If you have nicotine from snuff, nicotine gum, electronic cigarettes or any other nicotine producing product how could they tell the difference? so if you use products that produce nicotine, you are labeled tobacco and have to pay the surcharge. If you tell them you do not use tobacco and in the course of blood tests yearly, they detect nicotine, how will they know what product produced it and what would be the penalty?
 
My spouse is subject to the employer health insurance smoker surcharge due to Nicorette use. The foundation of the surcharge is not only the effects of carcinogens (like tar), but also nicotine, which although it is not classified as a carcinogen, it has been noted to directly cause cancer through a number of different mechanisms, and has several indirect impacts, such as promoting tumor growth. There are also concerns about nicotine causing birth defects. But most directly, there is a concern about how nicotine increases blood pressure and heart rate in humans, contributing to a set of problems unrelated to cancer.
 
You all make good points on the declaration and verification of tobacco use.

I suspect the surcharge scheme is further flawed when there is an arbitrary 50% surcharge.

I think it's important to draw a distinction between smokers' long-term health outlook versus short term. If a smoker is shopping for life insurance, a premium bump is very logical. Once a policy is written, the risk reward relationship is set for as long as the insured keeps paying his premiums. Smoking increases the likelihood of a fatal disease taking one's life sooner than the others in your age cohort. This is an observable fact at the time the policy is written, and can be calculated "fairly" on an actuarial basis.

Health insurance has different math. Is it a verifiable fact that annual (or even lifetime) health care expenses are exactly 50% greater for tobacco users at all ages? I doubt it.

Add in politics, the verification issues, the exclusion of subsidy on the surcharge and the fact that tobacco use is the only lifestyle or health condition that does not fall under the PPACA's pre-existing condition rules, and it's pretty clear that the tobacco use penalties are just that, penalties.

Fair? Maybe, maybe not. My point is that the whole tobacco surcharge issue is mathematically suspect, and as such will be the subject of continuing debate as the PPACA system evolves.
 
they are saying a smoker surcharge but what it really means is anyone who uses tobacco. If you have nicotine from snuff, nicotine gum, electronic cigarettes or any other nicotine producing product how could they tell the difference? so if you use products that produce nicotine, you are labeled tobacco and have to pay the surcharge. If you tell them you do not use tobacco and in the course of blood tests yearly, they detect nicotine, how will they know what product produced it and what would be the penalty?

I try to find the logic in this but can't. Being punished for using nicotine gum or mints and being treated like a smoker is wrong. My doctor has said they are fine and you can be on them indefinitely provided you have no serious heart problem. FDA even said they are safe to use indefinitely. Yet Two Ton Tessy (or Ted) gets a free pass for gorging themselves into serious if not numerous health issues and gets a free pass.
 
So if someone in Colorado 'smokes' something legal in that state, that doesn't contain nicotine. They are a 'nonsmoker'. But chew on a piece of gum and your now a smoker. Yea I get that.

MRG
 
Right or wrong it is nothing specific to ACA. All insurance having tobacco usage surcharges but they don't test for smoking other substances. ACA was somewhat patterned after existing group health plans which typically include a tobacco usage question. In group plans they would probably deny claims for things found to be tobacco related. In the individual market they would cancel your policy. But why would you be using nicotine gum unless you were a smoker.

Government declared war on tobacco almost 40 years ago, obesity is just now getting attention so it may get a hit in the future.

Maybe it would be better to put a health tax on the actual tobacco product at point of sale rather than penalties on the insurance premium.
 
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