I’ve got a threefer for you today, starting with the headaches ♡bamaCare!!! is giving even large corporations with departments of people on hand just to deal with this kind of paperwork crap:
The forms — the 1094-C and the 1095-C — are designed to track compliance with the Obamacare rule that mid- to large-sized employers offer affordable health insurance to workers or face a fine.
The 1094-C forms will be used by companies to indicate to the IRS where they’ve complied with that rule, and 1095-C forms will indicate whether a worker and his dependents have received job-based health coverage.
ADP, which provides outsourced payroll and human resources management services, found that even when companies knew about the forms, not all of them have been compiling the often-complicated data to complete them.
ADP’s Vic Saliterman concluded, “That’s a bit concerning.”
Remember when Obama promised that ♡bamaCare!!! would lower costs by reducing “waste and inefficiency?” It’s a dim memory, but it’s still there.
But if employers are having trouble figuring out the paperwork, regular Americans are already figuring out how to game the new system. Politico reports that an unknown numbers of people are
buying coverage only after they find out they’re ill and need expensive care — a trend insurers warn is destabilizing the fledgling health law marketplaces and spiking premiums for everyone.
Insurers blame the problem on lax rules that allow more than 900,000 people to sign up for coverage outside the standard enrollment season — for instance, when they change jobs or move — without sufficient proof they are eligible. No one knows precisely how many might be manipulating the system, but the plans say they run up much higher medical bills and then jump ship, contributing to double-digit rate increases and financial losses.
Health plans also complain some customers are exploiting a three-month “grace period” — when they can keep getting subsidized coverage even if they’ve stopped paying their share of premiums.
The phrase you’re looking for is “death spiral.” As for the ♡bamaCare!!! cheaters — well, it’s not like the Democrats who authored this law weren’t given plenty of warnings about the perverse incentives. (This CATO podcast from 2009 was more prescient than most.)
The net result is that more and more insurers can’t afford to sell insurance to ♡bamaCare!!! customers — the very people the law was ostensibly designed to help:
Humana Inc. has added its name to the list of mega-medical insurers to report big problems under ObamaCare.
The Louisville, Ky.- based company does not expect to make enough money this year in premiums from individual plans to cover what it will pay out in claims, according to a regulatory filing made last week with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Humana, which is being acquired by Aetna Inc., said it is still trying to figure out how big the gap will be. The company did say it has set aside a premium deficiency reserve – meaning, it’s setting aside money to help make up the difference.Humana, which will provide a deeper dive into its 2016 outlook when it releases its fourth-quarter earnings on Feb. 10, said in the SEC filing that it expects membership to drop this year by 200,000 to 300,000. The decrease reflects plans sold under ObamaCare as well as older policies.
“We expect Humana will exit Health Insurance Exchange marketplaces in 2017 in light of this data.”
This thing is coming off the rails, and a lot of people are going to get crushed when it does.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member