CMS recently announced that 8.3 million U.S. residents signed up for federal exchange plans for the 2020 coverage year during the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) latest open enrollment period, with total signups down slightly when compared with the previous open enrollment period.
Details on open enrollment data
The ACA’s federal open enrollment period for the 2020 coverage year launched Nov. 1, 2019, and was scheduled to end on Dec. 15, 2019. However, in response to reports of technical glitches on HealthCare.gov that occurred during the first and final days of the open enrollment period, CMS relaunched open enrollment at 3:00 PM EST on Dec. 16, 2019, and allowed U.S. residents to sign up for federal exchange plans through 3:00 AM EST on Dec. 18, 2019. CMS said the extension would give U.S. residents who experienced difficulty signing up for a federal exchange plan because of the glitches additional time to do so.
CMS on Dec. 20, 2019, released preliminary data on federal exchange signups that occurred from the open enrollment period’s launch on Nov. 1, 2019, through Dec. 17, 2019. The data also included specific details on signups that occurred during the last week of the ACA’s latest open enrollment period, which spanned from Dec. 8, 2019, to Dec. 17, 2019.
The data included signups in the 38 states that use the federal exchange for enrollment. The data did not indicate whether individuals paid their first month’s premiums, a step that effectively completes the enrollment process.
The data also did not include signups that occurred on Dec. 18, 2019, during the final three hours of the open enrollment period. In addition, the data did not include signups from people who left their contact information with representatives from the federal exchange’s call center because the call center was experiencing high call volume. Such individuals can sign up for coverage at a later date, Modern Healthcare reports.
8.3M signed up for or were automatically re-enrolled in federal exchange plans, CMS says
CMS said about 8.3 million individuals selected or were automatically re-enrolled in federal exchange plans as of Dec. 17, 2019. That total included about 4,421,179 individuals who selected or were automatically re-enrolled in federal exchange plans during the last week of the ACA’s latest open enrollment period.
According to CMS, the 8.3 million individuals who selected or were automatically re-enrolled in federal exchange plans included:
- 2,062,474 new customers; and
- 6,241,376 returning customers.
Signups down less than 2% from last year
Overall, the preliminary number of total signups that occurred during the ACA’s latest open enrollment period were down by about 1.8% when compared with the nearly 8.5 million signups that occurred during the open enrollment period for the 2019 coverage year:
Source: Advisory Board