The board of Colorado鈥檚 health exchange is pushing for an overhaul to speed up lengthy Medicaid and insurance applications.
Consumers trying to enroll in health plans via must first fill out a complex Medicaid application 鈥� then must wait to be approved or denied before they can move on to the next step. That process can take up to 45 days.
If Medicaid takes the full legal 45-day limit to give a response, consumers will miss the Dec. 15 deadline to sign up to have coverage start or continue Jan. 1. The that the board, citing that looming deadline, is urging officials to streamline the process.
Exchange officials and consumer advocates think that complicated application is partly to blame for the low number of enrollments in the state. In the six weeks the exchange has been open, only about 3,400 Coloradans have signed up for coverage.
The state announced Monday that it will hold four public hearings around the state for consumers whose policies have been canceled as a result of the Affordable Care Act. More than 250,000 policies in the individual and small group markets have been canceled in Colorado.
DOI spokesman Vince Plymell says one reason the state has seen so many cancellations is that insurers must notify affected customers within a certain time frame. He thinks the tide could be slowing.
"Companies who are remaining in the market, if they鈥檙e terminating someone鈥檚 plan, have to give that person 90 days notice; [while] companies exiting the market have to provide at least 180 days notice," Plymell> says. "I鈥檓 thinking that鈥檚 why we鈥檙e seeing them about this time. I wouldn鈥檛 be surprised if there are a few stragglers here in the next couple of months, but I think we've seen the bulk of these."
Plymell says some of the terminated policies didn't meet the minimum requirements set by the new health care law.
The Division of Insurance hasn't yet announced when or where the public meetings will be held.
