Agents Are Concerned

With the new MLR requirements agents are feeling the squeeze and are not happy about it:

http://aishealth.com/archive/nhpw022111-03

Once state insurance exchanges are operational in 2014, there will be a role for brokers and agents, particularly in the small-group market, said former Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner Joel Ario, who has headed HHS’s Office of Insurance Exchanges since September. A provision in the law requires states to create Small Business Health Options Programs (SHOP) exchanges to help small employers find coverage and enroll workers. Agents, he explained, often do more for small employers than just help them choose health plans. NAHU has long argued that navigators need to be licensed, as agents are, to ensure that they understand the complexities of

health coverage. Ario said the law envisions “baseline similarities” between navigators and insurance agents. However, he said agents sometimes don’t possess necessary “linguistic capacities” and “don’t necessarily serve all of the different populations as well as they could be served.” Those comments were met with boos.