healthcare.gov

A pain to navigate through. Good luck getting anything through the website on your own.

Everything about having a plan through the Marketplace has been difficult. Enrolling was difficult, getting the Marketplace information to connect with the insurance company was difficult (and took weeks to resolve), correcting the start date was difficult. I guess it only makes sense that getting my tax form is difficult too. I received an email saying it would be available by Jan 31st but I had not received it. I gave it an extra week or two because I thought it was in the mail. I finally called in Feb and they confirmed I did not have a 1095-A on file. They opened an escalation ticket and said that they have 45 days to respond. 45 days! That means I have to file a tax extension because it will not be resolved by the time taxes are due. I have called a dozen times asking for updates but I keep being told that they can't do anything until the 45 days has elapsed and that this is a "very busy time for them"...well yes, at what other point in the year would people be needing tax forms!?!? Sounds like they need to hire more people instead of take 45 days to resolve one issue. Don't ask to speak to a manager, or ask if you can file a complaint; that sort of thing simply doesn't exist. You are at their mercy and will pay the repercussions for their mistake. You have to call endlessly for updates. You have to file a tax extension and you have to wait extra time for your refund. It is very very frustrating. I will say that all 15 people I have spoken to have been very nice and I understand that their hands are tied. I am more annoyed with the process than anything else. It's ridiculous. Imagine me telling the Gov that it will be 45 days before I provide them with a response. Give me a break.

Plans are good but customer care reps are rude. Spoke to a guy called Alex, he disconnected the call since he did not know the answer to my question. Similar experience with 2 other reps.

They only provide price quotes for medical insurance and nothing for dental or vision. Why not provide a packaged deal for all services - medical, vision, and dental?

Very... Very... rude supervisor when calling the number *******596, Jenny Brown. We are both senior citizens and dont like being rude or having being cut off on our conversations... Maybe the owners of this site or telephone number ought to pay a little more and get competent telephone customer friendly personal.

Very... Very... POOR customer service

I retired before 65 yo (medicare eligibility). Needed an affordable monthly insurance premium as I couldn't afford the state med insurance with student loans and a mortgage payment. I applied on HealthCare.gov and had a great agent for the Bright Health Insurance which helped me qualify for an extremely affordable monthly premium for my circumstances. What they neglected to tell me was that I would have to be paying back to the irs the tax credit I received and qualified for the full year I used this insurance at the time I would have to file my taxes. The total amount I owed back to the irs was over $5,000! I am a retired teacher and this is going to cause a financial burden for me. This is criminal! Wanted to warn anyone else thinking of using this insurance coverage.

The site promises to have an affordable plan. I have applied for a 70 y. O. woman as a helper in a community center. The poor woman in the state of VA had to pay a minimum of $1330 a month.
The lady, according to the files that I had to provide for the site has practically no income and lives off her family and some savings. There is nothing "affordable" in Obamacare.

Well I sent in my proof of income and some incompetent employee put in that I made 220,000 instead of 22,000 so I had to file an appeal. I am very technically challenged and couldn't figure out how to do this. I now have 2 weeks to get this appeal in but trying to do this on my computer has caused me great hardship. They say it's my responsibility to appeal their mistake and now I can't figure out how to get the form through this adobe reader so I give up! I'm so stressed out over having to appeal their mistake that I'm going to lose my insurance! I guess I'm just an idiot!

I called July 5th to cancel my policy due to the fact that my new job provided health care from the day I started. Previously through Healthcare.gov/BCBS I was paying just under $500 a month for my coverage. I wanted to cancel immediately after I was positive that I was covered by my new job for obvious reasons, to save money. The representative informed me that he would put in the termination request, but it would take a few weeks to "process". July 22nd would be the actual day of termination. It's "policy" I was told. I'm thinking that in this day and age we are all using computers. Everything with the exception of maybe unclogging a toilet is done on a computer. I don't understand how processing this is more than just a mouse click away. Maybe communicate with the main office is only done using smoke signals or carrier pigeons or something? I don't know.

Anyway, I asked him what would happen as far as financial responsibility goes for the next 2 weeks that it was going to take to "process" my request. I mean, it's not my fault that it was going to take that long, right? Rightfully July 5th should be the "effective" date since that's when I called. I shouldn't have to pay anything after that considering I wasn't going to need the coverage. I would even go as far as to provide proof of my new insurance if I was asked for it. I must have been asking too many questions and pressing the issue a little too far because the representative had enough. He transferred me to a manager.

The manager gets on. The word "policy" is bounced off of me a few more times before he assures me that there was nothing that could be done. In the end I was going to have to pay for that time between the day I called to cancel (July 5th), and the actual day "processing" would be completed and my coverage would be terminated (July 22nd). The total it will cost me for that time? Roughly $250.

I've got news for you. If that health coverage is going to be kept active until July 22nd with me paying for it, then we're both going to be paying. I already made an appointment to have a chat with my neurologist. Then I'm going to make an appointment with my primary for a full physical. I'm talking the whole package. Blood work and everything.

Thank you Healthcare Marketplace! Because of your "policy" I've been gifted 2 weeks to get all of this stuff done on your dime!

This website has general information for those who have their own insurance. But it gets an "incomplete" for those who have employer insurance or Medicare supplement insurnace, as retirees. For example, retiree-only health insurance is explicitly exempted by the Affordable Care Act and this fact is very, very hard to find. Also, CMS has given waivers to many health insurance plans that are employee-sponsored. One example from heathcare.gov at http://www.healthcare.gov/law/features/rights/sbc/index.html: "All health plans must provide an SBC to shoppers and enrollees at important points in the enrollment process, such as upon application and at renewal." This simply is not true.

After 8 months with affordable, decent health coverage through the program, I tried to re-enroll. The website directed me to apply for my state's Medicaid program, which I did. I was accepted, and so figured that, as explained in the Healthcare.gov notices I'd received, I would no longer have insurance through them after Dec. 31. No problem, since I now had Medicaid. However, they sent me re-enrollment emails anyway, and I went through the process to see what was going on. Would they still want to offer me the same coverage with subsidies that made my bill only $148 per month? Well, I found out that there would be no subsidies for me going forward, so I would be paying over $900 per month for insurance I didn't even need. I let it go. Then, yesterday, I got a notice that $185 was taken from my account to pay for another insurance premium. I called my insurance company and they said that I was automatically re-enrolled, based upon info from the Marketplace. I called the customer service line at healthcare.gov, and they said that the onus had been on ME to let them know that I wasn't continuing. This AFTER they had told me in no uncertain terms that re-enrollment and coverage ended Dec. 31. Moral of the story: Make sure to alert them if you do not intend to re-enroll after the end of the year. They are not accountable in any way, and will bleed you dry without reason. The only reason I gave them 2 stars is that the coverage was, for that one year, both affordable and useful.