Bcbs wait time

[AllenChicago]

These are all new clients. Mostly ones that were on the high risk pool.

My ICHIP high risk pool people are now paying MORE in premiums with ObamaCare. How crazy is that. Not having any problems with people who are new to the colored company, it's the ones who had 2013 plans and bought 2014 plans that are suffering.

 

[kgmom219]

@Allen....are you kidding?

My high risk pool client premiums went down by about 40% with ACA compliant plans. That's where this is Texas. We don't help our own. Including Medicaid expansion. And our uninsured is hovering around 25%. For those reasons.

Its all of my new 2014 policies that are suffering. And the ones that switched from a 2013 to 2014 (I only had a handful) are really getting scr***d.

 

[AllenChicago]

@Allen....are you kidding?

My high risk pool client premiums went down by about 40% with ACA compliant plans. That's where this is Texas. We don't help our own. Including Medicaid expansion. And our uninsured is hovering around 25%. For those reasons.

Actually, those in their 40's and under who were in the ICHIP (not the PCIP) high risk pool (and are over 400%FPL) are paying MORE for their 2014 Obamacare plan. The older folks did see a premium decrease with ObamaCare. The few who qualified for the APTC really had a premium drop.

 

[kgmom219]

PCIP was significantly cheaper than the Texas High Risk Pool.

BTW....I called Blues this morning. My clients had signed up for auto-draft at the time of the application and it was not processed correctly, so they got a bill. They are turning on auto-draft for 2/1. I asked the poor girl on customer service if I was the first one who had called this in or was it widespread and I needed to contact my clients. She said it was third call she had on the issue. And it was the same thing every time. It didn't feed over.

If the CIO at Blues doesn't get fired, I want to know who they are sleeping with.

 

[AllenChicago]

I have 23 people who didn't get drafted, even though we enrolled at the BCBS website. Instead they got a paper bill...and then called me. Since I'm not willing to wait on hold for more than 1 hour, I'm just telling clients not to make a manual payment because they signed the form/included checking-routing info..it was part of their online application, as it always is. The applications were not submitted through healthcare.gov, (we were told way back in September NOT to start the process at healthcare.gov) but right at the bcbsil.com website.

The legal onus is on BCBS-IL to collect the money in the manner in which these applicants directed them to on the application. The company processed the application and sent out ID Cards. So what's the problem with executing the checking account draft? They've done this for a couple of decades flawlessly.

The e-mail they sent out late this afternoon says that a BCBS-IL hotline will be available on Saturday (tomorrow) due to lots of January 1st policies that haven't been paid for yet. Our MGA's office told me this morning that there are "many many thousands" of bcbs agency clients who haven't paid their premium..and thousands of them who were pre-2014 clients that had their 2013 policy mistakenly extended into 2014, who were waiting on a refund of the January premium.

BCBS-IL will experience legal hell in 7 days if they don't take drastic action. In some ways, it will be an appropriate payback for the hell they've put many of their customers through.

 

[kgmom219]

Yep. I agree.

But the ones I have called on, they rep can see that they signed up for auto-draft, but they are NOT on auto-draft. The rep can fix it for a 2/1 withdrawal. But its not going to happen without a phone call.

I have only one 2013 client with an issue, but I can't get him on the phone. Made the last call today. His $10/month and no referrals isn't worth the hassle.

 

[AllenChicago]

Yep. I agree.

But the ones I have called on, they rep can see that they signed up for auto-draft, but they are NOT on auto-draft. The rep can fix it for a 2/1 withdrawal. But its not going to happen without a phone call.

I have only one 2013 client with an issue, but I can't get him on the phone. Made the last call today. His $10/month and no referrals isn't worth the hassle.

Yep, if you can't reach the guy and he's ignoring the bill he received in the mail, it's probably best let him go. He'll probably call YOU in a panic after Feb 1st and then get upset that the only option is a more expensive 2014 plan, eff for 3/1/14.

IL BCBS will only draft 2 months at a time now after the initial premium. Were they to pull a Feb 1st draft for those the ones they botched on January 1st, the draft will be for Jan/Feb/Mar.. Ouch! Oh well, that's their fault for having such an inflexible billing system. (1st of the month, or nothing)

IL BC issued a notice earlier in the week giving people until February 28th to pay the February premium. Getting themselves locked into a pattern that will be hard to break.

If the insurers share this data with the public, we'll probably see an unprecedented number of non-payments across the country.

 

[AllenChicago]

1-27-2014
To quote our state's largest MGA for BCBS.. In 5 days "many many thousands of customers will lose their health insurance coverage because the company has yet to draft the January premium, as requested on the application." Lawsuits are being prepared.

 

[kgmom219]

Are you kidding me???

I just spot checked my clients and their original draft was completed with the application. So they are paid through January.

My issue is that automatic bank draft was not done, as requested. So all of my clients got bills, even when they signed up for auto-draft. I just sent an email to all of my 1/1's.

This may be Texas/Illinois. We are required to have a 30 day grace period, so no one is going to term until March 1, anyway. Is he saying that if you don't pay the 2/1 payment, they are going to sue? Or people who applied for 1/1 haven't been drafted and are going to get termed on 1/31? That's not going to happen. BCBSTX will just shut that part of the system down. They aren't THAT stupid. I hope.

 

[tired redneck]

I spent the first two weeks after the 24th deadline on the phone trying to clean things up for clients, and honestly still am spending time on it. Has anyone else had delays so bad in answering slow enrollments that it was finally "discovered" that the client needed to reapply to the marketplace? I have a client that was signed back in Nov, stalled until Jan 16 until they finally informed me that she had to "reapply" with the marketplace because the problem appeared to be on that end. Needless to say they offered no reimbursement, FL blue did not reach out to her and now her start date is March 1. She basically told FL Blue to hike it. She stayed with her current indemnity plan and will go on medicare with Humana in August. Is there anyone else with issues that are being resolved through the marketplace setting start dates back?