Stronger actions are needed immediately to thwart insurance brokers who fraudulently enroll or switch people in Affordable Care Act coverage, Sen. Ron Wyden, chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, said Monday.
“We want the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to hold these brokers criminally responsible for ripping people off this way,” he told KFF Health News.
In a sharply worded letter sent to CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, the Oregon Democrat expressed “outrage” over the practice, which nets unscrupulous agents commission payments while leaving consumers with a potential host of problems, from losing access to their regular doctors or treatments to higher deductibles and even owing taxes.
Noting that tens of thousands of Americans have been victimized, Wyden called on regulators to step up enforcement and be more proactive in notifying potentially affected consumers. He vowed to introduce legislation that would make participating in such schemes subject to criminal penalties.
“CMS must do more and you must do it now,” he wrote in his letter.
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Complaints about such unauthorized enrollment schemes have grown in recent months. KFF Health News has reported that unscrupulous brokers or agents can easily access policyholder information to change their coverage through private commercial platforms integrated with the federal Obamacare marketplace, healthcare.gov, which serves 32 states.
The challenge for federal regulators is to thwart the activity without reducing enrollment — a top priority for President Joe Biden’s administration.
CMS, which oversees the federal website, said it’s working on regulatory and technological fixes and can suspend or terminate problem agents’ access to healthcare.gov.
The agency will respond directly to Wyden, said Jeff Wu, acting director of CMS’ Center for Consumer Information & Insurance Oversight, i …
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Stronger actions are needed immediately to thwart insurance brokers who fraudulently enroll or switch people in Affordable Care Act coverage, Sen. Ron Wyden, chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, said Monday.
“We want the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to hold these brokers criminally responsible for ripping people off this way,” he told KFF Health News.
In a sharply worded letter sent to CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, the Oregon Democrat expressed “outrage” over the practice, which nets unscrupulous agents commission payments while leaving consumers with a potential host of problems, from losing access to their regular doctors or treatments to higher deductibles and even owing taxes.
Noting that tens of thousands of Americans have been victimized, Wyden called on regulators to step up enforcement and be more proactive in notifying potentially affected consumers. He vowed to introduce legislation that would make participating in such schemes subject to criminal penalties.
“CMS must do more and you must do it now,” he wrote in his letter.
Email Sign-Up
Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.
Complaints about such unauthorized enrollment schemes have grown in recent months. KFF Health News has reported that unscrupulous brokers or agents can easily access policyholder information to change their coverage through private commercial platforms integrated with the federal Obamacare marketplace, healthcare.gov, which serves 32 states.
The challenge for federal regulators is to thwart the activity without reducing enrollment — a top priority for President Joe Biden’s administration.
CMS, which oversees the federal website, said it’s working on regulatory and technological fixes and can suspend or terminate problem agents’ access to healthcare.gov.
The agency will respond directly to Wyden, said Jeff Wu, acting director of CMS’ Center for Consumer Information & Insurance Oversight, i …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]