Last September, after the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act gave the Department of Health and Human Services authority to review premium rates in states that didn’t have strong enough review programs, the agency began handing down decrees of “unreasonable” premium rates for insurers that proposed increasing rates by an average of 10% or more – meaning HHS can publically shame an insurer.
“HHS and states are really coming down hard on just about any carrier, which is creating a lot of angst at the carrier level and hand wringing. HHS seems very proud of it; so, this is a hot topic [among] insurance carriers and state-level bureaucrats,” says Alan Cohen, chief strategy officer and co-founder of Liazon, a private health insurance exchange that serves mainly small employers. “But, in another realm where benefits managers live, this is a nonevent; they’re not paying attention. Maybe they read it in the newspaper, but what matters to them is what the effect will be to their renewal.” Cohen says that, depending on the size of the employer, rate increases may differ. Even if an employer is going with one insurer who is increasing rates, the company may not be any better off with another carrier.
