Double-billing on policies. Conflicting information. No insurance cards. Four-hour waits to talk to a customer service agent.
That’s a sample of the problems consumers are voicing about Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois, the state’s largest health insurer, and other carriers since the biggest health insurance overhaul in a generation became a reality on Jan.1.
Insurance companies grappling with the complexities of the Affordable Care Act are now having to assuage angry and confused customers, many of whom are caught in a purgatory between old policies and new, and sometimes paying for both.
With phone lines jammed and online queries left unanswered, consumers turned to social media to air their frustrations, tapping into Twitter and Facebook in the hope they’d get help resolving their issues.
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“I’ve sent a total of five messages on (Blue Cross and Blue Shield’s) website starting in November, and all I’ve received is one canned response. The phone wait times are in excess of 60 minutes every time I call. I can’t get through,” said Jessica Rosengard, a 42-year-old self-employed Web designer. “It’s insanity.”
Many of the issues stem from a last-minute reversal by the White House that allowed some policyholders to keep their old insurance plans, even if they didn’t adhere to new requirements of the complex health law.
Because the decision to allow the sale of old plans in Illinois didn’t come until late November — after many consumers already opted to buy new coverage — insurers had to scramble to figure out which plan consumers wanted to keep and reconcile their records to reflect those choices.
Customer service agents already were under pressure, helping customers, many of whom were buying coverage for the first time, navigate new plans offered under the health law.
Further, a mid-December decision by the federal government to extend the deadline for people to buy policies effective Jan. 1 put more pressure on carriers to handle enrollments and resolve issues.
Blue Cross ran out of time, leaving about half a percent, or “a couple thousand,” of its Illinois individual policyholders enrolled in two plans simultaneously and charging them for both, the company said.
That’s what happened to Rosengard, of Chicago, who paid $438.84 for her new policy on Dec. 31 but was charged an additional $440.25 on Jan. 8, resulting in an overdraft fee from her bank.
Unable to resolve her issues through Blue Cross’ call center or website, she resorted to Facebook and Twitter, where she sent a series of barbs at the insurer.
It wasn’t until then that she started seeing progress.
“It’s unfortunate that you have to take it public to get anything done,” Rosengard said. “I’m still kind of going back and forth, but they’ve agreed to refund me. I’ll believe it when I get that check in the mail.”
Blue Cross’ Twitter page, usually filled with health tips and other helpful information for its customers, read more like an airing of grievances during the first two weeks of January.
Austin Waldron, the chief customer service officer for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois and its Chicago-based parent company, apologized to customers and blamed the issues largely on the late and unexpected changes implemented by the Obama administration and the state of Illinois that allowed customers to keep existing plans.
By the time the insurer sent customers letters informing them of the change, much of the processing for new policies already had occurred. Wary of canceling consumers’ plans while they mulled a decision on whether to go with their new plan or keep their existing coverage, Blue Cross intentionally kept plans active until they heard from customers, Waldron said.
“We got caught in that period between the president’s announcement and the state’s decision” on whether it would allow insurers to offer plans once slated for cancellation, Waldron said. “We’re thinking, ‘We don’t want to just cancel everybody.’ We were faced with trying to do a lot of comparisons, and it’s a lot of work to figure that out.”
Blue Cross vowed to issue refunds to those customers, including any bank overdraft fees they incurred. The company also said last week that it would reverse a $9.95 processing fee some customers were charged for paying online or by phone.
As of Thursday, the company had resolved many of the issues affecting enrollees who selected coverage effective Jan. 1, though “we have a couple of thousand (customers) left to sort through which policy they have,” Waldron said.
Date: January 19, 2014