A real-life ObamaCare horror story
We’ve all heard how nightmarish ObamaCare is. It really hit home for me recently — thanks to the bureaucratic hell some good friends of mine are going through.
My friends are a young married couple — she’s in her late 20s and he is in his early 30s. They’ve got two kids — a newborn and a two year old. The husband recently quit his job with a local government entity to take the plunge with his wife into the world of entrepreneurship. While starting their business, they — like good citizens — went through the ObamaCare exchange to get family coverage through Blue Cross.
Anyway, this couple recently got a letter from Blue Cross Blue Shield saying that their insurance was going to be cancelled ONE WEEK from the date of the letter. (Of course, they received the letter SIX calendar days after the date on the letter.)
Why was the insurance being cancelled? This couple had — apparently — not sufficiently proved to Blue Cross Blue Shield that they are legal US citizens. (Now, for the record, these two are the whitest white people with the whitest white people names.When you talk to them, it’s clear that English is their native tongue. They both have social security numbers and birth certificates showing that they were born in US states.)
Facing a loss of their health coverage within 24 hours, my friends started burning up the phone lines. Blue Cross Blue Shield told them there was not a whole lot that could be done — “the system” was down. The BCBS rep told them they could try and call back in a day or two.
Their next stop was the health care exchange. The web site was down, and they got trapped in telephone voice-mail hell.
The wife told me she finally was reduced to ”crying on the phone to Richard Burr’s assistant.” That’s right, Richard Burr. You know, the guy who said defunding ObamaCare was “the dumbest idea” he’s ever heard of.
For what it’s worth, this couple STILL has not been informed about WHAT exactly qualifies as “sufficient” proof of US citizenship . And their coverage STILL has not been restored.
Ugh, that sucks. Sorry to hear about their plight, hope they get it worked out.
I was curious, so googled, “ACA exchange proof of citizenship”… looks like a known issue a few months ago. One of the top links indicated,
“If the information submitted in an application does not match government records, applicants will be asked to provide proof of their citizenship or immigration status in order to receive the benefits. “.
I had forgotten about that one… wow, about a million cases had inconsistencies back then…
Narrowing the timeline down, interesting article that could be related? Looks like a couple 100k people:
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/2015/02/12/Thousands-Get-Booted-Obamacare-Plans
What a mess the whole thing is.
Horror stories about Obamacare abound, especially here at tax time, where many of those who thought they were getting a partial freebie with subsidies are now having to pay them back. Then there are those who are finding the deductibles and co-pays under Obamacare so much higher than their previous policies that they are foregoing medical care.
The real question is why we do not have Republican leaders in Congress with the backbone and the ‘nads to go balls to the wall to repeal this monstrosity? In the Senate, they can use Budget Reconciliation to get around the filibuster, just as Harry Reid did to pass Obamacare in the first place. If Obama vetoes the repeal, tie the repeal to the funding of major welfare programs and let him try and veto that!
Weepy Boehner and Milquetoast McConnell do not have what it takes to get the job done. That much is clear. They need to be replaced by real leaders who can, or the GOP brand may be irrepairably damaged.