Healthcare.gov

**Zimbow** · 10-16-2013, 12:28 AM

Obamacare shock: $12,600 deductible, 40 percent co-pay, zero competition

Many Americans shopping for better health insurance deals promised by the two-week-old Obamacare system are instead being slapped with rate shock, including savings-sapping deductibles and co-pays, according to multiple reports from around the country.

For some able to get the problem-plagued Obamacare website to work, the so-called “deals” the system is coughing up around the country include $12,600 deductibles, co-pays of up to 40 percent, zero competition, and rate hikes of 260 percent.

The huge cost increases that some Obamacare applicants are seeing are feeding the effort in Congress to change the system and delay implementation until January 2014.

"This is why we've been working so hard to dismantle and repeal this bill, so that we can begin to pass step-by-step reforms that transform the health care delivery system by putting patients in charge, giving them more choices, and reducing the cost of health care so that more people can afford it,” said Tennessee Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander.

The top Republican on the Senate health committee has collected several official and media reports of the Obamacare horror stories Americans have encountered so far. They include:

-- A $12,600 deductible. CNNMoney reported that one family “found a bronze-level plan for roughly $357 a month, after their subsidy, which they could swing. But it comes with a $12,600 family deductible.”

-- Enormous rate increases. A research group found that a 30-year-old male nonsmoker “will see his lowest cost insurance option increase 260 percent.”

-- Some who already buy their own insurance are receiving cancellation notices -- and offers for expensive new policies. The Christian Science Monitor reported on a North Carolina family who had been buying Blue Cross and Blue Shield insurance for $380-a-month.

“BCBS is offering them a new plan for three times the cost, $1,124.50 a month, still with an $11,000 deductible,” reports the paper.

-- A California couple said that the Obamacare policy suggested to them included a 40 percent increase in their doctor's office co-pay. “Our co-pay skyrocketed from 0 percent to 40 percent and the maximum out-of-pocket increased an additional $2,300,” according to a letter in the Fresno Bee.

-- Kaiser Health News found a lack of competition in some pockets of the country. “Eighteen percent of counties have only one insurer offering plans and 33 percent of counties have only two insurers competing.”

— There is little uniformity to premiums charged around the nation. “For instance,” Kaiser also reported, “Cigna is offering 50-year-olds one of its midlevel plans for $614 if they live in Flagstaff, Ariz. That same plan, contracting with different hospitals and doctors, will cost $428 in Phoenix and just $395 in Nashville.”

http://washingtonexaminer.com/obamac...rticle/2537200

**Zimbow** · 10-16-2013, 12:32 AM

Obamacare website firm's execs had White House access

Senior executives from CGI Federal -- the company that won theObamacare website contract -- enjoyed high-level access to top Obama administration officials, according to White House visitors' logs.

CGI Federal is the U.S. subsidiary of CGI Group, the Canadian company based in Montreal that won the $93 million contract from theDepartment of Health and Human Services in December 2011 to build Healthcare.gov, the main Obamacare web site.

Prior to the official award, senior CGI executives met with top White House officials and attended a number of invitation-only addresses by President Obama.
According to the logs, CGI Federal President Donna Ryan visited the White House six times prior to her company being selected to do the IT design work behind the high-profile website.

Two of the meetings attended by CGI executives were with Vivek Kundra, Obama's chief information officer. Kundra was a key figure in Obama administration information technology initiatives across the government.

Ryan met Kundra on June 21, 2010, in the latter's Old Executive Office Building office, according to the White House visitor logs.

In that meeting, Ryan was accompanied by three additional CGI executives, including George Schindler, who in January 2013 would be appointed president of CGI in the U.S. and Canada.

Also attending was Donna Morea, who oversaw the firm's U.S., European and Asian operations.
The day after Ryan met with Kundra, she was invited to attend an Obama speech touting the benefits of the Affordable Care Act and the need for a new "Patients' Bill of Rights.”

Earlier, on Jan. 7, 2010, Cheryl Campbell, another CGI executive who was deeply involved with the company’s health care contracts, attended a White House meeting with Kundra.
In 2009, Campbell was appointed senior vice president of CGI’s federal public sector health division. She was an early Obama supporter, giving $1,000 to his primary campaign against Hillary Clinton in June 2007.

Joining Campbell at the meeting was Andrew McLauchlin, a former CGI vice president, who was part of a company-government networking program called the “CGI Initiative for Collaborative Government.”

McLauchin was also an Obama financial supporter, giving $2,300 to the Obama Victory Fund and another $2,300 to Obama for America.
The initiative McLauchin headed provided a soft landing place for at least six other former high-ranking federal officials.

According to the initiative’s web page, its six top leaders hailed from long careers in federal departments and agencies.
John Loonsk, for example, was a former director for health information technology at HHS, which awarded the Obamacare web project. He is now CGI’s chief medical officer, as well as a member of the initiative.

James Peake was secretary of veterans affairs under President George W. Bush, and is now CGI's senior vice president for the health industry sector and an initiative member.
Others include Molly O'Neill, the former chief information officer at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, who is now a CGI vice president.

Barbara Fast, a former U.S. Army major general, is a CGI senior vice president for defense matters and part of the initiative.
Patricia Healey was the former chief financial officer for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. She is now a CGI executive consultant.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/obamac...rticle/2537235

**tpeichel** · 10-27-2013, 01:50 PM

**tpeichel** · 10-27-2013, 11:34 PM

Looks like it is down again tonight.

http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/27/news...html?hpt=hp_t2

A malfunction in key technology behind the Obamacare website left users unable to apply for health coverage late Sunday.

Joanne Peters, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services, said a vendor networking issue at Verizon subsidiary Terremark was to blame. Peters said the vendor had "experienced a failure in a networking component," and the attempted fix crashed the system.

**tpeichel** · 10-30-2013, 09:34 AM

As Sebelius is speaking this morning, the website is down...again. I thought they were bringing in these guys to save the day?

**~~Wickabee~~** · 10-30-2013, 10:04 AM

Starting with the clever early, I see.

**tpeichel** · 10-30-2013, 10:18 AM

It is a farcical situation.

**~~centrehice~~** · 10-30-2013, 10:30 AM

Any Health Insurance Company that has a National Profile, has done this, that is why my Son's Health Insurance has increased by exactly 2.6 times the cost………. Exactly.

The 3 State thing is Balderdash, it's happening in every State, and every Protectorate from Guam to Puerto Rico and the USVI.