The board of the state health insurance exchange, Connect for Health Colorado, voted unanimously Monday to spend up to $5.1 million through fiscal year 2016 to try to fix technology problems with online enrollment.
Staff said they expect the investment in technological “enhancements” to be offset in $6 million in reduced costs within 15 months. The fixes should should lower costs at the call center and allow more consumers to become customers.
The potential for savings could go as high as $9 million, staff said.
Problems with online enrollment for 2015 caused the budget for the exchange’s call center to soar from $13.6 million to more than an estimated $21 million.
The board earlier approved an additional $322,000 through the end of February to try to sign up applicants stalled in the state health insurance exchange’s enrollment system.
While the board and its legislative oversight committee won’t see a final draft budget for the exchange for fiscal year 2016 until the end of June, staff has made various forecasts showing they previously underestimated the revenues needed for self-sufficiency by year’s end.
A $26 million annual budget, previously predicted by exchange officials to be sufficient once startup expenses and federal grants were behind them, turns out to be inadequate, according to their latest projections.
Exchange budgets of the next three years could fluctuate from $34.5 million to $44.1 million in size, the financial forecasts indicate.
Financial planning documents show scenarios in which the current fee on health insurance plans purchased through the exchange, 1.4 percent, is increased as high as the federal exchange rate , 3.5 percent.
Additionally, the exchange is authorized to collect a broad market assessment from carriers, which currently is $1.25 per every health plan member outside the exchange, an estimated 875,000 people. The financial plans indicate an increase to the maximum allowed by law, or $1.80 per insured.
State insurance commissioner Marguerite Salazar, a non-voting board member, said the exchange likely would not see cost or revenue stability for two or three years.
“We’re being impacted by the continuing implementation of the (Affordable Care Act),” Salazar said.
She reminded the board that about 75,000 individuals who currently have non-compliant health plans under the act would be entering the marketplace next year.
“Call center costs could continue to go up,” Salazar said. But so would revenues.
Interim CEO Gary Drews said the exchange’s undersized staff, even when its 48 positions are filled, continues to be a hindrance to the exchange’s mission of lowering the state’s number of uninsured.
“We do need to add staff. The pace of audits has not let up,” Drews said. “We’re diverting a lot of resources to that work.”
The exchange has about 12 vacancies at the moment, including the top post.
The board selected a final candidate for CEO, Bob Malone , on April1, after an eight-month national search. However, a few hours earlier, Sen. Ellen Roberts, R-Durango, the chair of the Legislative Health Benefit Exchange Implementation Review Committee, had set up a subcommittee to draw up proposed qualifications for the job. Legislators review the board’s selection before a formal offer of employment can be made.
Roberts told The Denver Post late last week that the bipartisan group of four will identify the CEO’s needed skill set and consider the appropriate compensation package independent of the board’s recent selection of Malone.
“We’re not going to move any faster,” Roberts said. “Not to be obstructive about it — I understand the vacuum of leadership — but we will provide oversight.”
As the income tax deadline looms, Drews said the exchange sent out about 108,000 1095 tax forms to consumers who received advance premium tax credits in connection with purchasing plans. About 5 percent of the forms had to be corrected for diverse reasons, he said, but mostly because people experienced income changes.
Date: April 13, 2015