Providers are being given more time to make their filings due to uncertainty with legislation.
The Affordable Care Act continues to stand as it was despite Trumps efforts to repeal it, leading states to extend health insurance deadlines. Without any certainty regarding the White House’s strategy to change legislation, states are giving insurance companies more time to submit their 2018 rates.
Among those states include New Hampshire, Colorado and Kentucky, which have moved deadlines to June.
The health insurance deadlines in those states had previously been in April or May. The goal is to provide health insurers with additional time to assess the market and more accurately decide on next year’s rates.
In New Hampshire, for example, health insurance companies had previously been required to submit their 2018 rates by April 24. That date has been extended to June 2, says the state’s insurance department in a memo. New Hampshire Insurance Department Director of Life, Accident and Health Insurance, Michael Wilkey, explained that if the White House or federal lawmakers release new guidance before that time, the deadlines may be extended even more.
States are trying to adjust the health insurance deadlines to be fair to insurers as the Trump administration moves forward.
“We are watching what unfolds in Washington like everybody else is,” said Wilkey. “Carriers need to have as much information as possible to see what the market will look like in 2018.”
Senior Republican aides are expressing optimism that when Congress returns from its current recess, it will bring the health care debate back into the spotlight. This will be a vital step if the GOP is to avoid a government shutdown deadline on April 28.
Should the GOP be unable to produce an agreement in Congress, it will be up to the Trump administration to decide whether or not the federal government will continue to pay insurance companies about $7 billion per year in subsidies. That subject is currently in litigation under a May 22 court-ordered deadline for the Trump administration’s decision.
The Colorado Division of Insurance has yet to give its new health insurance deadlines but has said that it will be “mid-June” instead of the previous May 15th. Maryland, California, Connecticut and Oregon all have May 1 deadlines and New York’s is on May 15.
