We can haz health insurance
Dec. 17th, 2014 03:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pameladeanBut it was -- not an epic. Not a saga. Not exactly a comedy of errors, for which actually I am grateful, as those are generally far less entertaining to be in than to witness.
However, it was closer to a comedy of errors than to anything else; so, with that in mind, I present to you the following story.
Last year the MNSure website really didn't work right. Before I discovered this, I cheerfully clicked around and did stuff to see what would happen. What happened was an application of such profound borkedness that I had to call MNSure and wait on hold to annoying music for a period of time I then believed would be etched in my memory forever, but which in fact was not. I was eventually connected to a very pleasant and patient person who finally said that I seemed to have two applications running and they would have to be deleted and I would have to start over. In the meantime, I provided my back-of-the-envelope judgement of what our income was. I was, as it turned out, wrong, and we would probably have been eligible for tax subsidies, but it was a reasonable estimate for the amount of information that I had. We were at that time three years behind on filing our taxes (DON'T ASK), so I didn't have very good information. The helpful person said that I really should fill out the application but that if my numbers were right, we were not eligible for tax subsidies. He would see that the duplicate applications were deleted, if I could hold.
So I held and held and held and held until I had to hang up in order to preserve my sanity from the music. It's not that it was egregiously and obviously horrible, it's just that there are very few things that I can listen to for two hours. And if they had music that I could listen to over and over for that long, plenty of other people couldn't.
I never was able to start a new application, nor did I ever get through to MNSure on the phone again.
In the end, I used the MNSure website without logging in, to compare plans; chose one; and bought it at the website of the insurance company, PreferredOne. They had by far the cheapest plans, but there didn't seem to be major complaints lodged against them in any public venue I could discover, the coverage was as reasonable as that of other plans (which is to say, pretty crappy, but that is what happens when you engineer a health-insurance law to make the insurance companies happy), and the deductible wasn't too horrible to contemplate.
On the whole PreferredOne did all right for us, with one major exception: They do not pay for flu shots in a retail setting. I went to get my shot at Walgreens in mid-September, and discovered this. When I called the clinic, they said they'd be offering flu shots beginning the first week of October. When I called again that week, they said they didn't actually have the flu shots yet. I went back to Walgreens and explained the situation, intending that they not have to bother to look up my insurance again, since determining that PreferredOne had this arcane and anti-public-health policy had taken a while -- PreferredOne certainly didn't tell ME about it at any stage of things. The Walgreens clerk said, "Well, if your clinic doesn't have the vaccine, we can give it to you free," and so they did; so it all ended well enough, but I was extremely put out at this policy and had already decided to change insurance companies when Raphael informed me that PreferredOne had dropped out of MNSure. I got a letter from them not long after. The premium for the plan we were on had very nearly doubled. They suggested alternative plans with premiums closer to what we had been paying, but they all had enormous deductibles attached. Besides, having done All the Taxes, I knew that we were eligible for a tax subsidy.
I accordingly went to the MNSure site when open enrollment began, and was unable to log in or start an application. I called them and was on hold for about 45 minutes. The new pleasant and helpful person sorted me out fairly rapidly: I still had one application active from last year, and that would have to be closed out. She did this and walked me through the login and password reset, and it all worked.
At this point the first real instance of user error rears its ugly head, though I feel MNSure has to share some of the blame. I did not carefully read the Enrollment Tips, since I had, however fruitlessly, gone through the same process the year before. I put in all the information that I had. David and I are both self-employed at this point, and we have a bizarre patchwork of short-term contracts, rental income, royalty payments, consulting income, and one-time things like David's teaching at a local community college or having a print sale, or my selling an essay or the reprint rights to a short story. I put in what I had, hit "Save and Exit," went back with more information as I collected it, hitting "Save and Exit" each time; and finally went to put the last of the information in. I could not get back to my application. I looked at the Enrollment Tips, and discovered that to avoid common system errors, one should clear one's cookies and history, and one should complete the application in one sitting and not hit "Save and Exit." I feel very strongly that if the "Save and Exit" button causes trouble it should be disabled, or else there should be a gigantic red banner telling you not to use it under any circumstances, not a politely-worded Minnesotan suggestion that maybe, on the whole, you should not do that.
Anyway, I cleared my cookies and history and tried again. No good; though I got a different error this time.
I called MNSure. Only half an hour this time. A pleasant, helpful person who sounded very much like the last one, but whose name I once again did not catch, walked me through what happened and said, "I've never heard of that happening. I don't know what to do." I have heard these words or similar ones before, but mostly from David when something goes haywire with my computer or my smartphone. The nice person collected herself and went to consult other nice people. In the end, she said they'd get rid of the application, and I should do it over and do it all at once this time.
This was only mildly annoying, so I did it, and I was instantly informed that we were eligible for tax subsidies in X amount, and I could view insurance plans with that amount subtracted from the actual premium. So I did that until my eyes crossed. If one wants to know what "tier" one's medications fall into and what providers are in-network for any plan, one has to click through to the insurance company's website. I don't suppose, on sober reflection, that the insurance companies actually don't want you to have the information; but they don't make it very easy. Each plan has slightly different providers, so that, say, a Silver Best Choice Grandiose Fireworks plan might include my clinic, which I do not intend to leave; while a Gold Best Choice Grandiose Fireworks plan might not include it, but a Gold Okay Choice Magnanimous Flowery plan might. This is the case for all the insurance companies on the exchange and all of their myriad plans. And I imagine that the insurance companies' websites were being hammered by all the people checking the same information.
In any case, this was Thursday December 10, and the deadline for enrolling for insurance coverage beginning on January 1, when the old PreferredOne plan would expire, was December 15. So I decided to take a break, rest my brain and eyes, and consult David in case he had any opinions. Here is the second place that user error comes in; though, again, MNSure has to shoulder some of the blame. I had finished my application, I reasoned, so it was okay to hit "Save and Exit."
When I went back the next day and logged in, I landed on a page with two options. The first was "Enroll in health insurance without financial assistance." The second was a notification that my application's status was "Pending."
Here is the third instance of user error. Since I did not want to enroll in health insurance plans without financial assistance, and since I had caused a lot of trouble to myself last year by cheerfully clicking around to see what would happen, I did not try that button.
I called MNSure. Two hours on hold. I got a third pleasant and helpful person, who said that since I was having technical difficulties enrolling, they would do a manual enrollment for me. She verified some of my information again, asked what plan I wanted to choose, and said that she had done the first part of the manual enrollment, but that somebody would have to call me back to verify the information again. She said they would make the utmost effort to do this by the deadline, but there was no guarantee. She said it would be a good idea for me to check on the progress of the application by calling regularly.
I was glumly contemplating several days of waiting for a phone call from MNSure and being afraid to take a shower or go anywhere without cellphone service, when the current nice person called back to say that she had not actually completed the manual enrollment because the application was still listed as Pending, but somebody would do it as soon as the application was processed, and the rest was the mixture as before.
I logged in on Saturday, December 13. My application was now listed as "Processed," so I figured I had a plausible excuse to bug them. When faced with the MNSure menu of options on earlier calls, I had chosen the one for technical issues, but this time I chose "Other." That resulted in a wait of only twenty minutes. The final pleasant and helpful person said that he could certainly finish the manual enrollment, but now exactly what was it that happened when I logged in? I told him. He excused himself to consult other nice pleasant helpful people. When he returned, he told me that if I pressed the button for enrolling in health insurance plans without financial assistance, my application should pop up with our allowed subsidy amount in it, and I should be able to view plans and enroll in one.
I clicked on the button. He was right. Having ascertained this to his satisfaction, he bade me farewell, and I enrolled us in the chosen plan.
A lot of people are no better than I am with the particular oddities on the website; and many people do not have the time to sit on hold, or, for that matter, to do their application in one sitting. I really hope they straighten this out by next year. It seems a misuse of their very dedicated, nice, pleasant, helpful staff to have these ambiguities and weirdnesses in the website.
Pamela
However, it was closer to a comedy of errors than to anything else; so, with that in mind, I present to you the following story.
Last year the MNSure website really didn't work right. Before I discovered this, I cheerfully clicked around and did stuff to see what would happen. What happened was an application of such profound borkedness that I had to call MNSure and wait on hold to annoying music for a period of time I then believed would be etched in my memory forever, but which in fact was not. I was eventually connected to a very pleasant and patient person who finally said that I seemed to have two applications running and they would have to be deleted and I would have to start over. In the meantime, I provided my back-of-the-envelope judgement of what our income was. I was, as it turned out, wrong, and we would probably have been eligible for tax subsidies, but it was a reasonable estimate for the amount of information that I had. We were at that time three years behind on filing our taxes (DON'T ASK), so I didn't have very good information. The helpful person said that I really should fill out the application but that if my numbers were right, we were not eligible for tax subsidies. He would see that the duplicate applications were deleted, if I could hold.
So I held and held and held and held until I had to hang up in order to preserve my sanity from the music. It's not that it was egregiously and obviously horrible, it's just that there are very few things that I can listen to for two hours. And if they had music that I could listen to over and over for that long, plenty of other people couldn't.
I never was able to start a new application, nor did I ever get through to MNSure on the phone again.
In the end, I used the MNSure website without logging in, to compare plans; chose one; and bought it at the website of the insurance company, PreferredOne. They had by far the cheapest plans, but there didn't seem to be major complaints lodged against them in any public venue I could discover, the coverage was as reasonable as that of other plans (which is to say, pretty crappy, but that is what happens when you engineer a health-insurance law to make the insurance companies happy), and the deductible wasn't too horrible to contemplate.
On the whole PreferredOne did all right for us, with one major exception: They do not pay for flu shots in a retail setting. I went to get my shot at Walgreens in mid-September, and discovered this. When I called the clinic, they said they'd be offering flu shots beginning the first week of October. When I called again that week, they said they didn't actually have the flu shots yet. I went back to Walgreens and explained the situation, intending that they not have to bother to look up my insurance again, since determining that PreferredOne had this arcane and anti-public-health policy had taken a while -- PreferredOne certainly didn't tell ME about it at any stage of things. The Walgreens clerk said, "Well, if your clinic doesn't have the vaccine, we can give it to you free," and so they did; so it all ended well enough, but I was extremely put out at this policy and had already decided to change insurance companies when Raphael informed me that PreferredOne had dropped out of MNSure. I got a letter from them not long after. The premium for the plan we were on had very nearly doubled. They suggested alternative plans with premiums closer to what we had been paying, but they all had enormous deductibles attached. Besides, having done All the Taxes, I knew that we were eligible for a tax subsidy.
I accordingly went to the MNSure site when open enrollment began, and was unable to log in or start an application. I called them and was on hold for about 45 minutes. The new pleasant and helpful person sorted me out fairly rapidly: I still had one application active from last year, and that would have to be closed out. She did this and walked me through the login and password reset, and it all worked.
At this point the first real instance of user error rears its ugly head, though I feel MNSure has to share some of the blame. I did not carefully read the Enrollment Tips, since I had, however fruitlessly, gone through the same process the year before. I put in all the information that I had. David and I are both self-employed at this point, and we have a bizarre patchwork of short-term contracts, rental income, royalty payments, consulting income, and one-time things like David's teaching at a local community college or having a print sale, or my selling an essay or the reprint rights to a short story. I put in what I had, hit "Save and Exit," went back with more information as I collected it, hitting "Save and Exit" each time; and finally went to put the last of the information in. I could not get back to my application. I looked at the Enrollment Tips, and discovered that to avoid common system errors, one should clear one's cookies and history, and one should complete the application in one sitting and not hit "Save and Exit." I feel very strongly that if the "Save and Exit" button causes trouble it should be disabled, or else there should be a gigantic red banner telling you not to use it under any circumstances, not a politely-worded Minnesotan suggestion that maybe, on the whole, you should not do that.
Anyway, I cleared my cookies and history and tried again. No good; though I got a different error this time.
I called MNSure. Only half an hour this time. A pleasant, helpful person who sounded very much like the last one, but whose name I once again did not catch, walked me through what happened and said, "I've never heard of that happening. I don't know what to do." I have heard these words or similar ones before, but mostly from David when something goes haywire with my computer or my smartphone. The nice person collected herself and went to consult other nice people. In the end, she said they'd get rid of the application, and I should do it over and do it all at once this time.
This was only mildly annoying, so I did it, and I was instantly informed that we were eligible for tax subsidies in X amount, and I could view insurance plans with that amount subtracted from the actual premium. So I did that until my eyes crossed. If one wants to know what "tier" one's medications fall into and what providers are in-network for any plan, one has to click through to the insurance company's website. I don't suppose, on sober reflection, that the insurance companies actually don't want you to have the information; but they don't make it very easy. Each plan has slightly different providers, so that, say, a Silver Best Choice Grandiose Fireworks plan might include my clinic, which I do not intend to leave; while a Gold Best Choice Grandiose Fireworks plan might not include it, but a Gold Okay Choice Magnanimous Flowery plan might. This is the case for all the insurance companies on the exchange and all of their myriad plans. And I imagine that the insurance companies' websites were being hammered by all the people checking the same information.
In any case, this was Thursday December 10, and the deadline for enrolling for insurance coverage beginning on January 1, when the old PreferredOne plan would expire, was December 15. So I decided to take a break, rest my brain and eyes, and consult David in case he had any opinions. Here is the second place that user error comes in; though, again, MNSure has to shoulder some of the blame. I had finished my application, I reasoned, so it was okay to hit "Save and Exit."
When I went back the next day and logged in, I landed on a page with two options. The first was "Enroll in health insurance without financial assistance." The second was a notification that my application's status was "Pending."
Here is the third instance of user error. Since I did not want to enroll in health insurance plans without financial assistance, and since I had caused a lot of trouble to myself last year by cheerfully clicking around to see what would happen, I did not try that button.
I called MNSure. Two hours on hold. I got a third pleasant and helpful person, who said that since I was having technical difficulties enrolling, they would do a manual enrollment for me. She verified some of my information again, asked what plan I wanted to choose, and said that she had done the first part of the manual enrollment, but that somebody would have to call me back to verify the information again. She said they would make the utmost effort to do this by the deadline, but there was no guarantee. She said it would be a good idea for me to check on the progress of the application by calling regularly.
I was glumly contemplating several days of waiting for a phone call from MNSure and being afraid to take a shower or go anywhere without cellphone service, when the current nice person called back to say that she had not actually completed the manual enrollment because the application was still listed as Pending, but somebody would do it as soon as the application was processed, and the rest was the mixture as before.
I logged in on Saturday, December 13. My application was now listed as "Processed," so I figured I had a plausible excuse to bug them. When faced with the MNSure menu of options on earlier calls, I had chosen the one for technical issues, but this time I chose "Other." That resulted in a wait of only twenty minutes. The final pleasant and helpful person said that he could certainly finish the manual enrollment, but now exactly what was it that happened when I logged in? I told him. He excused himself to consult other nice pleasant helpful people. When he returned, he told me that if I pressed the button for enrolling in health insurance plans without financial assistance, my application should pop up with our allowed subsidy amount in it, and I should be able to view plans and enroll in one.
I clicked on the button. He was right. Having ascertained this to his satisfaction, he bade me farewell, and I enrolled us in the chosen plan.
A lot of people are no better than I am with the particular oddities on the website; and many people do not have the time to sit on hold, or, for that matter, to do their application in one sitting. I really hope they straighten this out by next year. It seems a misuse of their very dedicated, nice, pleasant, helpful staff to have these ambiguities and weirdnesses in the website.
Pamela
