Anthem Blue Cross of California has included a section called Transgender Services in their Evidence of Coverage (EOC) documents for individual and family plans offered in California for 2015. While the seven paragraph section doesn’t provide a lot of details, it is a major step toward recognizing that individual plans must include such coverage to address the medically […]
Archives for January 2015
Blue Shield accuses Sutter Health of price gouging
Sutter Health patients love their doctors. Blue Shield of California has created a small public relations nightmare with their members when they announced that they would be dropping Sutter Health from their network of providers in 2015. To combat the image that Blue Shield is the bad guy in this battle of corporate health care titans, […]
Covered California releases IRS premium tax guidance
Covered California has released a variety of documents to help tax payers enrolled in their health plans report the Advance Premium Tax Credits (APTC) on their federal 2014 tax return. The guidance from Covered California discusses the IRS Form 1095-A Marketplace Statement the tax payer will receive, using it to fill out Form 8962 Premium Tax […]
We need open enrollment rules for Doctors and Hospitals
With the announcement that Blue Shield of California may be dropping Sutter Health physicians and hospitals from their list of network providers in Northern California, Blue Shield members are wondering if their health plans are any good. For all the good of health care reform under the Affordable Care Act consumers are learning that doctors […]
Health agent sues Covered California for damages
It is no news to the first wave of Covered California Certified Insurance Agents in 2013 that Californias online health insurance exchange was not ready for business. The number one complaint from agents was they were not receiving credit, and ultimately commissions, from the numerous individual and family enrollments they were performing. […]
Covered California promotes annoying telemarketing constest
Covered California solidified its role as a big marketing machine for health insurance by announcing a contest to promote its Small Business Health Option Program or SHOP. The top producer of quotes for the Covered California small group health plans will win 100 hours of telemarketing according a sales seminar slide shown during their seventh sales […]
Blue Shield drops Sutter Health for 2015
January 30th: Blue Shield and Sutter sign 2015 contract update January 5th Blue Shield Sutter falling out below Blue Shield of California jolted their members with a New Year’s announcement that they were dropping Sutter Health hospitals and doctors from many of their plans for 2015. The reason given was that Blue Shield was not […]
The transgender gift of 2014
An unexpected gift to my professional and personal life this past year of 2014 has been the numerous transgender men, women and families I became acquainted with as a health insurance agent. Through numerous conversations and correspondence I realized we had more in common with the transgender community than I previously thought. In reality, most of […]