This isn't an exact apples-to-apples comparison, since the Massachusetts number includes the "overtime" extension period while the other 5 states only run through 2/15/15, but I thought it would be useful to see how the 6 exchanges which had widespread technical issues last year fared this time around. Obviously other states like Washington and California had some snafus, but these are the ones which were seriously hosed last year to the point of requiring massive overhauls or which were completely scrapped in favor of a new platform (I'm not including HC.gov itself here since everyone already knows what massive technical improvements they've made).
The chart below refers specifically to QHP selections only (whether paid or not), and compares the 2015 open enrollment period (11/15/14 - 2/15/15...or 2/26 in the case of MA) against the 2014 open enrollment period (10/1/13 - 4/19/14). I've also included some notes for context.
The enrollment data from Hawaii has been sporatic and a bit squirrelly, with the few numbers being thrown around sometimes including the cumulative plan selections including 2014 enrollees whether they renewed for 2015 or not. When I posted my last Hawaii update, I was suspicious (at 16.1K, it was nearly twice last year's tally), but the article seemed pretty confident about the numbers, so I went with it.
Well this one was unexpected: It's not a formal press release, but this story from the Hawaii Reporter--which actually has a pretty negative slant to it--is chock full of actual, current enrollment data points for Hawaii...and they're pretty good, relatively speaking.
None of the numbers are precise--they're all rounded off...but it's still a breath of fresh air from the Aloha state, and brings the number of states which haven't provided renewal data down from 3 to two (of course, the other two are California and New York, but still...)
...The Connector had about 1,000 people enrolled at this time last year. As of Thursday, that number had grown to 16,000.
...More than 365 small businesses, with 2,400 enrollees, have joined the Connector through the Small Business Health Options Program, or SHOP, in part because of tax deductions available to them, Kissel said.
The 980K confirmed by the 14 assorted state-run exchanges,
The unreported renewals (both active and automatic) from California & New York, and
Another roughly 150,000 scattered amongst all 50 states & DC since the date of their most recent updates until today (which varies from as little as 1 day to as much as 25 days in the case of Idaho).
If you do the math, you'll see that the biggest missing piece here is the 3rd item above: Covered California and New York State of Health have, to date, still refused to give out any re-enrollment/renewal data for 2014 QHP enrollees. Not just autorenewal numbers, but active renewals as well.
Huh. OK, this one is unexpected, mainly because they waited until 4 days after the original 12/15 deadline to make the announcement:
The Hawaii Health Connector has extended the deadline for residents to enroll in health insurance that takes effect on Jan. 1.
The extension will be until noon on Dec. 31. The original deadline was this past Monday.
The state's health insurance exchange created by the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, signed up 3,500 residents in the first month of open enrollment , which started on Nov. 15. To enroll, call 1-877-628-5076 or go to www.hawaiihealthconnector.com.
So, that makes 3 states now which have bumped their deadline for January 1st coverage out until 12/31: Hawaii, Vermont and Minnesota.
Hawaii's updates are particularly frustrating because they have a tendency to only give the cumulative plan selections to date, mixing together 2014 & 2015 numbers regardless of whether they've actually enrolled/re-enrolled for 2015 or not. Therefore, it's refreshing to see a (relatively) straightforward update out of the Aloha state:
The Hawaii Health Connector enrolled 3,500 people in its first month of open enrollment, which ended on Monday, the exchange confirmed Tuesday.
The state's online health insurance exchange saw more than an eleven-fold increase in enrollment in comparison to its first month of enrollment last year, when the just 300 signed up for health insurance on the Connector.
Of course, they couldn't help but mix numbers together later in the story:
...To date, roughly 13,500 residents have signed up for health insurance coverage that will begin on Jan 1.
Kissel noted that the Connector has also connected 50,000 to the expanded Medicaid program, which came in with the Affordable Care Act at no cost to the state.
I'm actually a bit curious about the "new" specification here. Last week the head of the HI exchange gave an interview in which he gave the number as being 12,000, but it turned out that was a cumulative number which included all of the enrollments from last year (whether they had renewed yet or not) as well as the new additions. I thumbnailed it as being around 1,200 enrollments for 2015.
Therefore, I'm not sure how to take "nearly 1,500 new residents" in this case; that may mean "new for 2015 including renewals" or it may mean "new for 2015 not including renewals". Either way, the number isn't large enough to impact my spreadsheet/projections, but it's still a bit irritating:
Hawaii: Hawaii Health Connector has enrolled nearly 1,500 new residents as of Dec. 5. Last year glitches to the website caused enrollment to be delayed by two weeks. According to HealthInsurance.org, the state’s uninsured population has gone down from 8 percent of the population to 6 percent of the population since Obamacare went into effect..
I spent a few minutes this morning poking around all 15 ACA exchange websites (HC.gov plus the 14 state-run websites). Obviously I didn't go through and actually create an account or enroll/renew in any of them (although my wife and I did renew our own coverage via HC.gov on Saturday, and everything went fine). However, I at least visited all of the sites and clicked through as far as I could go without actually setting any accounts up.
For the most part, everything went smoothly. Yes, some of the sites have more confusing layouts/navigation than others, but my main concern was whether they load at all, how quickly pages load, whether any glitches or broken links pop up and so on.
When you visit the link, it goes to a video interview with the executive director of the HI exchange, who states, when asked "do we know how many signups there've been so far?" that "it's about 12,000; we were at 250 this time last year, so we've made a lot of progress."
Now, hold the phone a minute. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Hawaii only has around 53,000 residents total who are even eligible to enroll via the ACA exchange to begin with.
MASSACHUSETTS: The MA Health Connector allows for online premium payments (and in fact, payments have to be made to the exchange, not to the insurance company itself). The good news is that the website & billing system appear to be working properly this year, a vast improvement over last year's disaster. The bad news (or, odd news anyway) is that for some reason the system requires you to pay using only direct electronic fund transfers or a written check--it does not accept credit card payments!
I don't know if this is for technical reasons (which I doubt) or policy reasons (avoiding the 2.5% transaction fees or whatever), but it seems very odd to me.
HAWAII: Not only hasn't the HI Health Connector provided any enrollment updates since open enrollment started again on November 15th, they haven't even updated their enrollment report section since July 26th! Guys, either post an update or at least remove the link entirely; keeping it as is, locked in on 7/26 is just embarrassing.
