Micro Businesses Find Health-Care Rollout Is Slow 

 

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Porche Lovely of Denver attempted to enroll in a health-care plan through her state's new insurance exchange Tuesday because her employer doesn't offer health benefits.
Her employer? Porche Lovely.
Among the 22 million Americans expected to sign up for health insurance through the new state exchanges over the next two years are owners of micro businesses—companies with just a few or no employees.

Polixenni Photography

Porche Lovely, owner of a cupcake business in Denver, is looking to buy a health plan through her state's new insurance exchange.

But on Tuesday, the day the exchanges were supposed to begin accepting applications via the Web, technical glitches prevented many individuals from signing up, including Ms. Lovely, who owns a cupcake shop with three part-time employees.
Ms. Lovely says she hasn't had health insurance since 2004, when she was laid off from a large technology company where she worked as a project manager. She tried to buy insurance on her own but says she was denied because of a thyroid condition. She also says she nearly died two years ago from the H1N1 virus because she didn't want to rack up hospital bills going to the emergency room.
Ms. Lovely tried Tuesday to enroll in a health plan online through her state's insurance exchange but couldn't because the site was overloaded. "I just think it shows the demand for this is strong," she says. "I'll enroll as soon as I can."
Ms. Lovely, 39 years old, did make some progress. She called a toll-free number for help and says a customer-service representative gave her an overview of the exchange's plans and prices and promised to email her the information. As of Wednesday afternoon, however, the email had yet to arrive.
It is common for micro businesses to lack small-group insurance plans. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 55% of the companies with three to nine employees don't offer health benefits. The main reason: cost. The average annual premium for a single worker is $5,884, up 74% from a decade ago, Kaiser says.
As an alternative to the individual exchanges, micro businesses will be able to buy group insurance through new small-business exchanges in every state. Those exchanges were supposed to begin accepting online-enrollment applications Tuesday, but Obama administration officials announced last week that they won't be ready until early November.

 

 

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