The House of Representatives Oversight Committee has launched an inquiry into 17 state insurance exchanges implemented under the Affordable Care Act over concerns of “impostor” staffers and data security with the paper insurance applications.
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In a letter sent to the state exchanges last week, Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), along with subcommittee chairmen Reps. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), voiced concerns over the increased reliance states are having on person-to-person customer service agents and paper-based insurance applications in light of the HealthCare.gov website debacle, as well as problems on individual states’ online exchanges.
Under the 2010 Obamcare law, each states is obligated to have some sort of health-insurance exchange. States were given the option to build a state-based exchange, allow the federal government to set-up an exchange within the state, or pursuing a “hybrid” exchange that would be created using a combination of both federal and state-based resources and assets.
According to the letter, state-based and hybrid insurance exchanges are at risk for staffing and data security breaches in ways that federally controlled exchanges are not.
The titles “Navigators” and “Assisters” are given to the employees tasked with providing “unbiased educational and outreach efforts” on behalf of the insurance exchanges.
Earlier this year, testimony from staffers at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services noted that “con artists and identity thieves will pose as Navigators and Assisters,” and that “the problem will only increase as Obamacare is fully implemented.”
The letter points to reasons for concern about imposter customer service agents, as well as data breaches that may be committed by a state exchange’s actual customer service agents.
The letter then asks the executive leaders of 17 individual insurance exchanges to answer nine specific questions about the screening and hiring of Navigators and Assisters.
But Dave Self, an executive with Pacific Source Health Plans, which sells health insurance through both the Oregon and Idaho insurance exchanges, suggests that the congressional inquiry is politically motivated and not about legitimate security concerns.
“[I]f you pay attention to this committee (the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee) and some of their activities, there seems to be some effort to slow down Obamacare,” Self said at an Idaho insurance exchange board meeting October 4.
Bethany Frey, spokesperson for Washington’s state health-insurance exchange, told Rare she was unaware of the congressional inquiry.
“[W]e have met or exceeded all federal requirements” for data security and exchange staffing, she said.
On Monday November 4, Issa also released private meeting notes from staffers at Healthcare.Gov he acquired from HHS. According to the notes, on October 11, Healthcare.Gov officials openly discussed that the utilization of paper-based insurance applications by state insurance exchange workers would allow the state workers to “feel like they are moving forward in the process,” amid the failures of the Obamacare websites.
Dated October 30, 2013, the letter was sent to the executive directors of insurance exchanges in Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, Maryland, California, Idaho, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island and the District of Columbia.
The insurance exchange leaders have been given until November 13 to respond to the inquiry.
Read Rep. Darrell Issa’s letter
US House of Reps Letter to Colorado Exchange
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