re: #177 piratedan

re: #177 piratedan

yeah but nearly 950,000 profiles created w/o purchases… that means people are getting in and accessing the site and few folks are prepared to purchase health care four months in advance without shopping and number crunching… those numbers shouldn’t be discouraging.

It’s the usual media bullshit, as always it’s the numbers that THEY don’t report

I’ve just spent all afternoon trying to make sense of the the options available from the ACA. 102 to be precise. As you say, why enrole now if one has until March, or January 1st if one has no insurance, or doesn’t think one needs it now.

The problem is making sense of the coverages in relation to the premiums/deductibles/out-of-pocket which are all over the place for comparable premiums. Some are in state only, some have national plans. Some have (in higher brackets) no deductible and low OO pocket, while others with higher numbers there have similar premiums. It’s not hard if one has a maximum affordable premium, or deductible, or out of pocket, but in between it’s a problem picking a plan. I won’t until December.

Also, regarding the cancellation issue, it actually affects “grandfathered” policies pre 2010 also, for 2014 only, because while those may continue with the same basic terms, they will increase in cost because they actually do have ACA conditions attached. Mine for 2014 will increase by almost $100 per month for those reasons. (on the other hand premiums have anyway increased by 33% in the past 3 years; what else is new?).

The new ACA policies, from the same insurer, are similar at similar levels (see comparison difficulty above) but they do have non cancellation for arbitrary reasons, or maximum limits, which is important. I’m not sure if the grandfathered policies have that or not. Note to self. Check.

Finally there is the matter of tax subsidy. In the case of the self employed or partially retired predicting 2014 income can be tricky. If it is a fair bit less than about $66k (which I suspect many individuals will be) then the tax subsidy for the premiums can be substantial and depending what policy it is applied to it can bring a gold plan into the same premium range as a bronze or silver plan, which is probably what most pre ACA policies have been. Of course if the income is higher then one has to pay it pack from taxes, but if one doesn’t take the subsidy at the begining I doubt it is refunded. Note to self. Check.

If anyone has corrections or additions, I’d love to see them.