Feds delay ACA deadline for insurers

Revised rates can be filed through Sept. 5

Health insurers got a little breathing room this week for finalizing the rates on their 2018 Affordable Care Act marketplace offerings.

The original filing deadline has been pushed back in light of ongoing uncertainty about whether the federal government will continue subsidy payments that reimburse insurers for offering mid-range silver plans with lower deductibles and co-payments.

Federal officials said Thursday that insurers can file revised rates until Sept. 5, instead of the previous deadline next Wednesday.

Without knowing if they can count on subsidies, the insurers’ task of setting rates that balance affordability with their own profitability gets complicated.

The extra time may allow for a final decision on subsidies, but it narrows the window between getting those rates approved and the Nov. 1 launch of the 2018 open enrollment period.

The fate of the subsidies has been caught in the ongoing debate over the future of Obamacare and efforts to repeal and

replace the landmark 2010 health care law.

Since January, the payments have continued on a month-to-month basis but President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to end the subsidies as a means to push Congress to come up with an Obamacare replacement.

As recently as July 29, the president tweeted that if a healthcare bill repealing the ACA was not approved quickly, “BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!”

The “bailouts” he referred to are formally known as “cost-sharing reduction” or CSR subsidies, which help provide low-income individuals access to lower-cost marketplace plans.

Without the payments, state officials say Pennsylvania insurers would increase premiums by an average 20.3 percent statewide, likely making the plans unaffordable for many.

On July 31, Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner Teresa Miller sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Thomas Price “out of serious concern for the future of Pennsylvania’s individual insurance market” and the 426,000 state residents covered by marketplace plans.

“Ourinsurers desperately need stability,” she wrote.

“Without a commitment to make cost-sharing reductions to insurers for the entire 2018 policy year, I will be forced to permit our insurers to build the instability … into their rates.”

Insurers’ preliminary rate filings earlier this year averaged only 8.8 percent for 2018, she wrote, an indication that the market was stabilizing.

“I know you may believe Obamacare is failing. In Pennsylvania, it is not failing on its own. If our market fails, it is because of your actions, and its failure will rest squarely on your shoulders.”

States must submit final rates by Sept. 20.