Farmers Insurance® Announces New Finance and Business Insurance Executives
Farmers® names Giles Harrison to serve as Chief Financial Officer and Jim Hinchley as President of Business Insurance
Farmers® names Giles Harrison to serve as Chief Financial Officer and Jim Hinchley as President of Business Insurance
Insurer teams up with Kapi’olani Medical Center for Women & Children to help provide free educational resources to local community
The organization accepted the distinction during the VALOR Awards ceremony at Dodger Stadium
Consumer survey data reveals significant disconnect between safe driving beliefs and practices
This page is dedicated to helping consumers quickly find health insurance resources in the state of Colorado. Here, you’ll find information about the various types of health insurance coverage available in the state. You can find the basics of the Colorado health insurance marketplace/exchange (Connect for Health Colorado) and how open enrollment and special enrollment periods work for plans sold in the exchange; a brief overview of Medicaid expansion in Colorado; an explanation for why short-term health insurance is not available in the state; details about state-specific Medicare rules; as well as a collection of Colorado health insurance resources for residents.
Colorado has long been a leader in terms of healthcare reform. Before the ACA implemented reform on a federal level, Colorado had already made maternity coverage mandatory in the individual market, and had banned gender-based premiums.
Colorado became the second state in the nation to actively pursue single-payer healthcare, with Amendment 69 appearing on the 2016 ballot. However, voters rejected the push for single-payer by a wide margin (Vermont was the first state to implement a plan to achieve single-payer, but they abandoned that path in December 2014).
Colorado implemented a reinsurance program as of 2020, joining a growing number of states that are using 1332 waivers to obtain federal pass-through funding for reinsurance to reduce unsubsidized health insurance premiums and stabilize the state individual market. Individual health insurance premiums in Colorado dropped by an average of 20 percent in 2020, thanks to the reinsurance program (although after-subsidy premiums increased for many people who receive premium subsidies). And overall average rates decreased again in 2021, by 1.4 percent.
Colorado regulators and lawmakers were working on a public option program that the state hoped to debut in the fall of 2021, for coverage effective in 2022, but the legislation to create it was abandoned amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Lawmakers plan to introduce a different version of it during the 2021 session.
Colorado’s uninsured rate dropped by nearly half from 14.1 percent in 2013, to 7.5 percent in 2018, although it grew to 8 percent in 2019. The Colorado Health Access Survey found an even lower uninsured rate — just 6.5 percent — which has stayed steady from 2017 through 2019.
Colorado utilizes a state-run health insurance exchange — Connect for Health Colorado — which is one of just three exchanges in the nation with a permanently extended open enrollment period (November 1 to January 15).
The marketplace is used by individuals and families who need to purchase their own health coverage, as well as people who are eligible for income-based Medicaid or CHIP. People buy their own health insurance in a variety of situations, including being an early retiree, being self-employed, or being employed by a small business that doesn’t offer health benefits.
Colorado’s marketplace no longer offers small business health plans, but Kaiser still has exchange-certified small business plans for sale, which employers can purchase directly from Kaiser or with the help of a broker or agent.
Eight insurers participate in the Colorado health insurance marketplace as of 2021, and for 2021, three of the state’s insurance companies (Oscar, Cigna, and Rocky Mountain Health Plans) expanded their coverage areas. Insurer participation in Colorado is relatively robust compared with much of the country, but coverage tends to be localized and plan availability is concentrated in urban areas. In 10 of the state’s 64 counties, those who shop the state’s exchange have a single carrier option (Anthem Blue Cross/Blue Shield) in 2021 (but that’s down from 22 counties in 2020).
Average premiums in Colorado’s individual market dropped by 20 percent for 2020, but that was before any subsidies were applied. After subsidies, many enrollees saw higher monthly premium costs in 2020, due to lower benchmark plan premiums and the resulting decrease in premium subsidy amounts. For 2021, the eight insurers initially proposed an overall average rate increase of just over 2 percent, but once regulators finalized the rates, the changes for 2021 amounted to an average rate decrease of 1.4 percent.
Read our overview of the Colorado health insurance marketplace – including news updates and exchange history.
Colorado implemented rules to permanently extend its annual open enrollment period to 2.5 months (November 1 to January 15).
Open enrollment for 2021 medical insurance in Colorado ran from November 1, 2020 through January 15, 2020. This window was an opportunity for new enrollees to select coverage in the individual market (on-exchange or outside the exchange), and for existing enrollees to compare the available options for 2021 and renew or change their existing coverage. Enrollees should also provide updated financial information to the exchange during open enrollment, in order to have financial assistance eligibility based on accurate information for the coming year.
When there were still nine days remaining in open enrollment for 2021 coverage, Connect for Health Colorado announced that more than 172,000 people had enrolled in coverage. This was already a record high, and sign-ups continued to increase over the remaining days of the enrollment window. Enrollment the year before, for 2020 coverage, had reached nearly 167,000 people, although that was down from just over 170,000 enrollees in 2019.
To address the COVID-19 crisis, Colorado opened an emergency special enrollment period for uninsured residents. It ran through April 30, 2020, and 14,263 residents enrolled in coverage during that window.
Read more about the Colorado health insurance marketplace.
Learn more about how open enrollment works for individual market health insurance plans, both on-exchange and outside the exchange.
Colorado required all grandmothered (transitional) health insurance plans to terminate by the end of 2015. There are still grandfathered health insurance plans in Colorado, but all other individual and small-group plans are now ACA-compliant.
Colorado is among the 36 states and the District of Columbia that have expanded Medicaid eligibility under the Affordable Care Act. The ACA Medicaid expansion extends eligibility to most non-elderly adults at or below 138 percent of the federal poverty level.
As of mid-2020, total enrollment in Medicaid plans and CHIP plans in Colorado stood at nearly 1.4 million people, which was 77 percent higher than it had been in 2013.
Learn about Colorado’s Medicaid and Child Health Plan Plus (CHP+) programs at the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy & Financing website, and learn about Colorado’s Medicaid expansion in our overview.
As a result of strong new state regulations that took effect in 2019, there is no longer any short-term health insurance coverage available in Colorado. The state created a special enrollment period for people who had short-term health insurance in Colorado but who lost their coverage because their plan terminated and they were unable to purchase another short-term plan (because insurers no longer offer short-term coverage in Colorado).
In 2009, Colorado Sens. Mark Udall and Michael Bennet – both Democrats – voted yes on the Affordable Care Act. Colorado’s five Democratic House members also voted yes, while the other two representatives, both Republicans, voted no.
The current Colorado congressional delegation includes two Democratic Senators: Michael Bennett and John Hickenlooper, both of whom support the ACA. As of 2021, Colorado has seven representatives in the U.S. House: four Democrats, and three Republicans. Support for the ACA is split along party lines in the state’s House delegation.
At the state level, Colorado was one of the only states that moved in a bipartisan manner to establish a state-run health insurance marketplace. When John Hickenlooper was governor, he signed legislation authorizing the marketplace in 2011. The state marketplace is called Connect for Health Colorado. The state also adopted Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.
Before the ACA reformed the individual health insurance market, coverage was underwritten in nearly every state, including Colorado. People with pre-existing conditions were often unable to purchase coverage in the private market, or were only eligible for policies that excluded their pre-existing conditions or charged them premiums that were significantly higher than the base rate.
CoverColorado was created in 1991 to provide an alternative for people who were not able to get comprehensive coverage in the private market because of their medical history.
One of the primary reforms ushered in by the ACA was guaranteed issue coverage in the individual market. An applicant’s medical history is no longer a factor in eligibility, which means that high-risk pools are no longer necessary the way they once were. CoverColorado stopped enrolling new applicants at the end of 2013, and the program ceased altogether in March 2014.
By November 2020, there were 946,170 enrollees in Medicare in Colorado. About 56 percent of them were enrolled in Original Medicare, with the other 44 percent enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans instead.
Read more about Medicare in Colorado.
Read more about Medicare’s annual open enrollment period, which Medicare beneficiaries can use to compare available Part D and Medicare Advantage plans and renew or make a change to their coverage.
Colorado enacted legislation in 2019 to create a reinsurance program, and to get the ball rolling on a public option in the state, as described above. The Colorado Health Institute has an excellent overview of some of the key pieces of legislation the state passed in 2019.
Legislation that would have created the public option was abandoned in 2020, however, as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
See the bottom of this page for a summary of other recent state-level health reform legislation.
Louise Norris is an individual health insurance broker who has been writing about health insurance and health reform since 2006. She has written dozens of opinions and educational pieces about the Affordable Care Act for healthinsurance.org. Her state health exchange updates are regularly cited by media who cover health reform and by other health insurance experts.
The post Colorado health insurance appeared first on healthinsurance.org.
Due to the fact that health plans in Massachusetts must follow the state’s rules, including “guaranteed-issue and rating restrictions,” short-term health insurance in Massachusetts is non-existent. As a result, there are no short-term health plans available for purchase in the state.
State regulators in Massachusetts, along with a coalition of Massachusetts health plans, urged the Trump Administration to retain states’ rights to regulate short-term plans even after the federal rules were relaxed. The Trump Administration’s rules for short-term plans, which took effect in 2018, are clear in noting that states may continue to impose tighter regulations than the new federal rules, and Massachusetts regulators made it clear that they intende to do so, noting that
“We therefore support the ability to regulate our own insurance market in a manner consistent with our commitment to broad, shared, and stable risk pools, and, as such, do not intend to take up the new flexibility around STLD plans offered in the proposed regulation.”
Since 1996, Massachusetts has required all health plans marketed to individuals to be sold on a guaranteed-issue basis (ie, applications cannot be rejected based on medical history) “according to clearly defined rating rules.”
Massachusetts has had its own state-based individual health insurance mandate since 2006, and traditional short-term health insurance would not count as having coverage for the purpose of fulfilling the mandate. Although there is no longer a penalty from the federal government for not having minimum essential coverage, the individual mandate penalty in Massachusetts is still in force, and is collected on state tax returns.
The Massachusetts health insurance marketplace is available to residents in need of health insurance coverage, and offers a large variety of coverage options with premium subsidies and cost-sharing subsidies available based on household income (these subsidies help to offset monthly premium costs as well as out-of-pocket costs, with eligibility based on household income).
The health insurance plans sold in the marketplace are designed for people who are self-employed, employed by a small business that doesn’t offer health coverage benefits, or early retirees who aren’t yet eligible for Medicare.
Healthcare plans in the Massachusetts marketplace are available to anyone during the annual open enrollment period (which tends to be extended into January in Massachusetts, offering one of the longest enrollment periods in the United States). If it’s outside of the annual open enrollment period, you may qualify for a special enrollment period if you’ve experienced a qualifying event, such as losing healthcare coverage through an employer, moving to a new area, or getting married.
Based on your income you may also qualify for health insurance in Massachusetts under expanded Medicaid coverage. When the Affordable Care Act was enacted in 2010, Medicaid expansion was a cornerstone of lawmakers’ efforts to expand realistic access to health coverage and healthcare to as many people as possible. If you have a household income up to 133 percent of poverty (138 percent with the 5 percent income disregard), you will likely be able to enroll in Medicaid (MassHealth), and enrollment is available year-round.
Medicaid eligibility is also calculated on a monthly basis, so even if you earned more than 138 percent of the poverty level earlier in the year, or expect to do so later in the year, MassHealth can serve as temporary coverage during a time when your income is low. Once your income picks back up, you and your dependents will be eligible for a special enrollment period (triggered by loss of eligibility for Medicaid) during which you can change to private coverage offered via the Massachusetts marketplace.
And Massachusetts also has ConnectorCare plans, which are available to people with household income up to 300 percent of the poverty level. For people who are newly eligible or who have not applied for ConnectorCare coverage in the past, enrollment is available at any time.
Louise Norris is an individual health insurance broker who has been writing about health insurance and health reform since 2006. She has written dozens of opinions and educational pieces about the Affordable Care Act for healthinsurance.org. Her state health exchange updates are regularly cited by media who cover health reform and by other health insurance experts.
The post Short-term health insurance in Massachusetts appeared first on healthinsurance.org.
Colorado has a state-run exchange, Connect for Health Colorado. The state passed legislation in 2011 to create the exchange, and is among just 15 states (including DC) that are running their own exchanges and enrollment platforms for 2021 coverage.
Although some carriers exited the Colorado exchange at the end of 2016 — as was the case in most states — Connect for Health Colorado is still among the most robust exchanges in the country, with eight carriers offering plans for 2021. In the individual/family market there are 159 on-exchange plans available in Colorado in 2021, up from 130 in 2020.
Colorado implemented new regulations for short-term health plans in 2019, effectively eliminating them in the state. As of April 2019, there were no longer any short-term plans for sale in Colorado. But Colorado is among the states with the highest enrollment in health care sharing ministry plans, and had around 10 percent of the nation’s direct primary care clinics as of 2018. Sharing ministry plans and direct primary care plans are both sometimes seen as another alternative to ACA-compliant health plans.
Colorado has permanently extended open enrollment, so it runs from November 1 to January 15 every year. Open enrollment for 2021 health plans started November 1, 2020 and continued until January 15, 2021. As of January 6, enrollments had reached 172,000 — surpassing the 2020 total (which had been under 167,000) with more than a week remaining in the open enrollment period.
As a result of the coronavirus pandemic, nearly all of the state-run exchanges opened special enrollment periods to allow uninsured residents to sign up for health coverage (HealthCare.gov, which is the exchange platform that’s used in 36 states as of 2021, did not offer a COVID-specific special enrollment period). Colorado’s exchange opened a COVID-19 special enrollment period that ended April 30, 2020; more than 14,000 people enrolled in plans through the exchange during that window. That special enrollment period was for anyone who didn’t have minimum essential coverage — so it was not an opportunity for people to change their existing coverage, but it was an opportunity for people with plans that aren’t considered minimum essential coverage (such as health care sharing ministry plans) to switch to a real insurance policy.
Now that the open enrollment period for 2021 coverage has ended, normal special enrollment period rules apply in Colorado’s exchange. So people with qualifying events continue to have an opportunity to sign up for coverage. Loss of other coverage is always the most commonly-used qualifying event, and that’s especially true in light of the widespread job losses triggered by the pandemic.
In 2020, the average full-price (pre-subsidy) premium for plans purchased through Connect for Health Colorado was about $482/month — significantly lower than the national average of $576/month. But about three-quarters of Colorado’s exchange enrollees received premium subsidies that averaged about $374/month in 2020.
2020 was the first year that average premiums for ACA-compliant health plans decreased in Colorado, with an average rate decrease of more than 20 percent for 2020 individual market plans. But as described below, that applied to people who pay full price for their coverage. Many people who get premium subsidies saw increases in their after-subsidy premiums.
And for 2021, average premiums decreased again in Colorado’s individual market. Although the state’s insurers proposed an overall average rate increase of 2.2 percent for 2021, the Colorado Division of Insurance approved an overall average rate decrease of 1.4 percent. But that’s just an average; the actual rate changes that people experienced vary considerably depending on where they live, which insurer they use, and — if they receive a premium subsidy — how much the benchmark premium in their area changes.
Bucking the national trend, bronze plans became the most popular option in Colorado as of 2016, with 45 percent of enrollees picking bronze during open enrollment. Nationally, silver plans are twice as popular as bronze plans across all of the state-run exchanges, and more than three times as popular as bronze plans in states that use Healthcare.gov. Bronze plans were also more popular in Colorado than in other states in 2014 and 2015, but 2016 was the first year that bronze plan selections outnumbered silver in Colorado. That continued to be the case in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020.
Colorado has a lower-than-average percentage of enrollees who qualify for premium subsidies (although the number of people who qualify for subsidies increased when premiums grew sharply in 2017 and 2018), so there are a significant number of enrollees who pay full-price for their coverage. Bronze plans are the lowest-cost option, so they tend to appeal to people who have to pay full price. In 2020, two-thirds of unsubsidized buyers in Colorado selected bronze plans.
Colorado’s individual market insurers initially proposed an overall average rate increase of 2.2 percent for 2021, with some insurers proposing increases and others proposing decreases. But after some filings were revised and the rate review process was complete, the Colorado Division of Insurance announced that overall average rates would decrease by 1.4 percent for 2021, with average premiums declining for every insurer except Cigna and Anthem (and the approved increases for those two insurers are much less significant than the insurers had initially proposed).
In the small group market, insurers proposed an overall average rate increase of 5.7 percent, and the Division of Insurance approved an overall average increase of 3.8 percent.
For the eight individual market insurers, all of which sell plans through Connect for Health Colorado, the following average rate changes were approved for 2021 (listed in order of carrier market share, from largest to smallest):
Colorado’s reinsurance program, which took effect in 2020, is credited with keeping proposed premiums for 2021 an average of nearly 21 percent lower than they would otherwise have been.
In June 2020, Colorado lawmakers approved HB1236, which calls for the creation of an Affordable Health Care Coverage Easy Enrollment Program in the state, starting in 2022 (based on 2021 tax returns). The legislation, which was signed into law by Governor Polis in early July, is supported by the state-run exchange, Connect for Health Colorado, and is very similar to a program that Maryland implemented in 2020.
HB1236 will let Colorado residents indicate on their state tax returns that they would like Connect for Health Colorado to determine, based on the information on their tax return, whether they might be eligible for free or subsidized health coverage. If so, the exchange would be able to reach out to the person to help them enroll in coverage — Medicaid, CHP+, or a subsidized private plan in the individual market.
The legislation will create a special enrollment period for people identified by the program as eligible for free or subsidized coverage, so that they would have a chance to enroll in coverage early in the year (soon after filing their tax return) instead of having to wait for the open enrollment period in the fall. Amendments made by the Senate in June clarify that the person would have to be represented on a Colorado tax return filed by the April 15 deadline, and that the insurer will not have to further verify that the person is eligible for a special enrollment period.
A recent Colorado Health Access survey found that people with income between 139 and 400 percent of the poverty level (ie, people who are eligible for premium subsidies in the exchange) are more likely to be uninsured than people with lower or higher income. The easy enrollment program would help to identify these individuals and allow the exchange to provide them with targeted enrollment assistance outside of the normal open enrollment window.
Colorado Senate Bill 215 was signed into law on June 30, 2020. The law, which is known as the Health Insurance Affordability Enterprise, will fund the state’s existing reinsurance program for five more years (it was previously only funded through 2021), and will fund state-based subsidies to make coverage more affordable, as well as outreach and enrollment activities.
The law calls for the state to start collecting a new fee assessed on health insurance premiums for health plans subject to regulation by the Colorado Division of Insurance (ie, individual plans and fully-insured group plans, but not self-insured group plans). The fee will replace the federal Health Insurance Tax, which is being eliminated after the end of 2020. The bill will also impose a new assessment on Colorado hospitals, replacing (at a lower amount) the existing fee that funds Colorado’s reinsurance program.
The funding to make coverage more affordable will be allocated to two separate programs. The first, which will become available as of 2022, will send money directly to health insurance companies so that they can reduce premiums for people who receive premium subsidies under the ACA. This is designed to address the fact that people who get ACA premium subsidies are generally getting smaller subsidies now that the reinsurance program is in effect (details below), making their net premiums higher than they were prior to 2020.
The second program will be state-based premium subsidies, available starting in 2023, for people with income up to 300 percent of the poverty level who don’t get ACA premium subsidies (including undocumented immigrants and people caught by the family glitch).
New Mexico lawmakers tried to implement a similar bill earlier this year; it passed in the New Mexico House, but died immediately in the Senate. New Jersey lawmakers are working on similar legislation in 2020; if approved, it would start to provide state-funded premium subsidies as soon as 2021.
Colorado enacted HB1168 in 2019, paving the way for the state to create a reinsurance program for plan years 2020 and 2021 (SB215, described above, will provide an additional five years of state funding for the reinsurance program). The state’s reinsurance waiver proposal was submitted to CMS in May 2019, and received federal approval in July.
Colorado’s reinsurance program took effect in 2020, and resulted in overall average premiums (before subsidies are applied) decreasing by 20 percent. The reinsurance program is designed to reimburse insurers an average of 60 percent of the cost of claims that are between $30,000 and $400,000, although the actual reimbursement percentage varies by location. The program is structured to incentivize insurers to offer plans in areas of the state where few insurers previously offered plans, and to offset a larger portion of claims in high-cost areas of the state — ie, the mountains and rural areas — as opposed to the heavily populated I-25 corridor where health care costs are lower.
To that end, Colorado’s reinsurance proposal is innovative: It pays a larger percentage of claims in high-cost areas, with specifics that can vary from one year to the next. The goal of the program was to reduce premiums by 15-20 percent in the parts of the state where premiums were already lower, by 20-25 percent in areas where premiums were middle-of-the-road, and by 30-35 percent in areas where premiums were the highest.
For 2021, the reinsurance program will pay 40 percent of eligible claims in rating areas 1, 2, and 3 (Boulder, Colorado Springs, and Denver), It will pay 45 percent of eligible claims in rating areas 4, 6, 7, and 8 (Fort Collins, Greeley, Pueblo, and the eastern plains/south-central Colorado). And in the mountains and western part of the state, including Grand Junction, the reinsurance program will pay 80 percent of eligible claims (note that all of these percentages are a little lower than they were for 2020).
Overall, the state’s waiver proposal projected that reinsurance would result in a 16 percent average decrease in average premiums for 2020. And in July 2019, the Colorado Division of Insurance announced that insurers in the state’s individual market had proposed an average rate decrease of 18.2 percent for 2020, based on the assumption that the reinsurance proposal would be approved (the proposed average rate change would have been a 0.5 percent increase if the reinsurance program had not been approved). Once rates were finalized, the average rate decrease was even bigger, at 20.2 percent. For 2021, the Division of Insurance noted that the reinsurance program is still keeping premiums an average of 17 percent lower than they would otherwise have been.
When 1332 waivers are used to implement reinsurance, the general idea is that the reinsurance program results in lower premiums, which in turn, results in smaller premium subsidies being paid by the federal government. By using a 1332 waiver, the state gets to keep those savings (referred to as pass-through funding) instead of the federal government keeping the money that they save on premium subsidies. The state then utilizes that money, along with state funding as necessary, to cover the cost of the reinsurance program. Colorado’s waiver proposal projected that federal pass-through funding will be $170 million in 2020 (this projection was spot-on; the actual amount was $169.5 million) and $183 million in 2021.
Colorado’s individual market insurers — all of which offer plans in the exchange — implemented the following average rate decreases for 2020:
The final premiums for Cigna, Friday Health, and Kaiser were all a little lower (ie, a more significant rate decrease) than the insurers initially proposed.
Colorado insurers began adding the cost of CSR to silver plans rates as of 2019 (a change from 2018, when they spread the cost across the premiums for all plans), and continue to use that approach in 2020.
It’s noteworthy that although overall average premiums are dropping by 20 percent in Colorado in 2020 — the largest percentage decrease in the country — that rate decrease really only applied to people who don’t get premium subsidies (that’s about 20 percent of on-exchange enrollees, plus everyone who has ACA-compliant coverage outside the exchange, where subsidies aren’t available).
For people who do get subsidies, the subsidies decreased in line with reductions in the benchmark premium in each area. And some plans (including the benchmarks in some areas) had sharper premium decreases than others. As an example, consider a family of four (parents in their early 40s and two young children) living in Denver and earning $95,000 a year. We’ll keep them the same age in 2019 and 2020 and keep their income unchanged in order to compare apples to apples.
In 2019, they qualified for a premium subsidy of $747/month. And after that subsidy was applied, the least-expensive plan they could get was $355/month (a $6,000 deductible plan from Bright Health). If they wanted an HDHP in order to be able to contribute to an HSA, their least expensive option was $445/month after their subsidy. In total, there were 45 plans from which this family could choose.
For 2020, however, there are 58 plans, and unsubsidized premiums have dropped across the board — all of which is good news for people who don’t get premium subsidies. But this family’s subsidy shrank significantly, to only $379/month in 2020. That’s because the full-cost price of the benchmark plan is a lot lower: $1,159/month in 2020, versus $1,527/month in 2019 (those are two different plans; the benchmark in that area was offered by Kaiser in 2019, and by Cigna in 2020).
Because the benchmark plan is so much cheaper, premium subsidies for everyone in the area are smaller in 2020. For this family, the lowest-cost option for 2020, after their subsidy is applied, is $523/month. The same Bright Health plan that had a net premium of $355/month in 2019 is $529/month in 2020 — despite the fact that its full-price premium (ie, without any subsidies) dropped from $1,102/month to $909/month. If this family wants an HDHP in 2020, the cheapest one is $569/month.
So if we assume this family enrolled in the $355/month plan in 2019 and they wanted to keep it for 2020, their net premiums increased by 49 percent (from $355/month to $529/month). And shopping around wouldn’t have done them much good, because the cheapest option for 2020 (a similar plan from Bright Health) would have still resulted in a 47 percent increase in their net premium.
This is not a new phenomenon — it’s happened in other areas in previous years and it will continue to happen in various areas as insurer participation, plan options, and premiums fluctuate from one year to the next. But it’s important for enrollees to understand, especially given that Colorado garnered so many headlines about decreasing premiums for 2020.
It can be shocking to get a renewal notice indicating a substantial after-subsidy rate increase after seeing news reports about widespread rate decreases, but hopefully this summary helps to illustrate how rate changes for people who get subsidies don’t necessarily mirror rate changes for people who don’t get subsidies. If our Denver family had an income of $110,000 (and was thus not eligible for subsidies), they would see a reduction in their premiums from 2019 to 2020: If they had enrolled in the cheapest plan in 2019 it would have cost them $1,102/month, and it would have dropped to $909/month in 2020.
After many months of work by regulators and lawmakers, the 2020 legislation that would have created the “Colorado Option” plan was abandoned by lawmakers in May 2020, due to the COVID-19 crisis. If the bill had been successful, the Colorado Option plan would have been available to state residents during the open enrollment period in late 2021, with coverage effective in January 2022. But lawmakers felt that crucial stakeholders — including hospitals and medical staff — could not be expected to participate in the legislative process when their focus needed to be on the COVID-19 pandemic instead. And the budget shortfalls caused by the pandemic would also likely have made passage of the bill nearly impossible in 2020.
Lawmakers noted that they planned to try again in 2021, hopefully amid better circumstances. In January 2021, the bill’s sponsored confirmed that they were working to draft new legislation for consideration in the 2021 session, although they noted that it “will look different than last year’s bill.”
Here’s a backstory on Colorado’s public option:
H.B.1004, signed into law in May 2019, directed the Division of Insurance (DOI) and the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing (HCPF, which oversees Colorado Medicaid) to come up with recommendations for a public option health plan that would compete with private insurers in the state.
H.B.1004 included some basic parameters and guidance, but largely avoided the specifics of how the public option would operate. There were a variety of stakeholder meetings in 2019, aimed at gathering public input on how a public option in Colorado should be crafted. HCPF and DOI presented their draft proposal in October 2019, and their final proposal, with modifications based on public comments and stakeholder feedback, was unveiled in mid-November. Regulators hoped to have the program — referred to as the Colorado Health Insurance Option or simply the Colorado Option plan — up and running by the fall of 2021 so that residents could have coverage in effect as of 2022.
The proposal called for the Colorado Health Insurance Option to be available statewide, offered by the state’s existing health insurers. The individual market state option plans would have to spend at least 85 percent of premiums on medical costs, as opposed to the ACA’s 80 percent requirement (a Wakely actuarial analysis notes that this requirement would apply to the issuer as a whole, rather than just the Colorado Health Insurance Option plans offered by each issuer).
The proposal that the state unveiled in late 2019 stopped short of recommending exactly how much hospitals would be reimbursed under the state option plan, although the earlier draft proposal had recommended 175-225 percent of Medicare rates. In February 2020, the state published an overview of how hospital reimbursements would work under the new program. Hospitals would be paid a base rate of 155 percent of Medicare rates plus additional reimbursement for hospitals that fall into various categories (including critical access hospitals, independent hospitals, management of the underlying cost of care, or a high percentage of Medicare or Medicaid patients).
An actuarial analysis of the hospital reimbursement rate proposal notes that hospitals would end up being paid 155 to 218 percent of Medicare rates, with a statewide average of 168 percent (versus the current 280 percent that they’re currently paid). The analysis estimates that the average hospital can break even at 143 percent of Medicare payment rates, although there is considerable variation depending on location, patient demographics, and other factors. The program will not affect reimbursement rates for doctors and pharmaceuticals; it only sets reimbursement rates for hospitals/facilities.
The analysis also detailed how the state planned to create state-funded premium subsidies and cost-sharing subsidies that would be added on top of the ACA’s premium subsidies and cost-sharing subsidies. Colorado regulators have worked to try to ensure that people who receive premium subsidies will be adequately protected by the new program. They recognize that when average full-price premiums decrease (as they did with Colorado’s reinsurance program, and as they would under the Colorado Health Insurance Option) it directly benefits people who don’t get financial assistance under the ACA (ie, mostly people with income above 400 percent of the poverty level) but can result in people who do get financial assistance actually being worse off, as explained above.
So the plan was to use a 1332 waiver in order to recapture the estimated $43 million reduction in annual premium subsidies flowing into Colorado, and use those funds to provide:
The actuarial analysis projected that enrollment would increase by 18,100 people, all of whom are currently uninsured (or covered by plans like health care sharing ministries, which do not provide minimum essential coverage). Some would be eligible for subsidies, including the new state-funded subsidies, while others would be paying full price but would be able to take advantage of the lower premiums available through the Colorado Health Insurance Option, as premiums are projected to be an average of 12 percent lower than average premiums for other ACA-compliant plans.
[Note that the earlier version of the proposal projected an $89 million reduction in federal premium subsidies, which could be recaptured via a 1332 waiver. But the enhanced state-funded premium subsidies and cost-sharing subsidies are expected to result in more people enrolling in subsidized coverage, so the reduction in federal spending on premium subsidies isn’t going to be as substantial as initially estimated.]
Legislation to create the Colorado Option was introduced in March 2020, sponsored by Rep. Dylan Roberts (D, District 26), Rep. Chris Kennedy (D, District 23), and Rep. Kerry Donovan (D, District 5). But the COVID-19 pandemic began gripping the state, and the rest of the nation, later that month. And by early May, Colorado’s Democratic caucus had abandoned the legislation — although they’ve vowed to try again in 2021, noting that the pandemic highlights the need for a robust public health option in Colorado.
On January 6, 2021, Connect for Health Colorado announced that 172,000 people had already enrolled in coverage for 2021. There was still more than a week remaining in open enrollment at that point, and the enrollment tally had already surpassed the prior year’s enrollment, (when nearly 167,000 people had enrolled in medical plans for 2020) and reached a new record high for Colorado.
2020 was the first time Colorado’s exchange enrollment had dropped, after climbing each year from 2014 through 2019. And the 2021 enrollment total will certainly be a new record high, as it had reached that mark more than a week before open enrollment ended.
Here’s a look at Connect for Health Colorado enrollment over the years (note that the enrollment reports published by Connect for Health Colorado typically differ from the numbers published by CMS, generally due to small differences in the reporting periods):
Here’s a look at how average rates have changed in Colorado’s marketplace over the years:
2015: Average increase of only 0.71 percent in the ACA-compliant individual market.
2016: Average increase of 9.84 percent, although it was 12.14 percent if we only count plans sold in the exchange. Average rate changes by carriers and rate sheets for each region of the state are available on the Division of Insurance website (click on “more” under the “approved plans for 2016” section). The Division of Insurance also created an at-a-glance map of the state that shows average rate increases by area, for both the individual and small group markets.
Three carriers that offered coverage in 2015 pulled out of the market in 2016: Colorado HealthOP, New Health Ventures (Access Health Colorado), and Time Insurance Company (Time only sold off-exchange plans in 2015, and exited the market nationwide at the end of the year). Golden Rule began offering individual market health plans in 2016, but only outside the exchange.
In the Denver area, benchmark premiums increased by an average of 32.2 percent for 2016. The benchmark plan is the second-lowest-cost Silver plan, and it’s not the same plan from one year to another. The increase in Denver (and across much of Colorado) was due to the fact that Colorado HealthOP had the lowest rates in most parts of the state in 2015, and their plans weren’t available in 2016. When compared with the average benchmark prices in other areas across the country, Denver’s rates were still very much in line with the national average.
2017: Average increase of 20.4 percent for individual market plans (on-exchange, the average was 20.9 percent, while off-exchange, it was 19.9 percent). In the small group market, the average increase was just 2.1 percent.
2018: Average rate increase of 34.3 percent for individual market plans. Insurers had initially proposed an average rate increase of 26.96 percent, although that included two filings for plans that would only be available off-exchange (Freedom Life, at 27 percent, and Anthem’s catastrophic PPO, at 33.5 percent).
Despite a robust review, regulators were only able to make a slight reduction in the proposed overall average rate increase, getting the average down to 26.7 percent from 26.96 percent. Most of the approved rates were very similar to what insurers had proposed, although the DOI made some significant changes to the rates that were filed by Bright Health and Cigna.
But those rate filings were based on the assumption that funding for cost-sharing reductions (CSR) would continue in 2018. The Division of Insurance noted in September that they had backup rates that would be used if CSR funding were to be eliminated. On October 12, the Trump Administration announced that CSR funding would end immediately. As a result, the backup rates were implemented in Colorado.
The Division of Insurance noted that the overall average rates would increase by 6 percentage points over the already-approved rates. Ultimately, the average rate increase in Colorado was 34.3 percent for 2018. Colorado was one of only five states where the cost of CSR was added to plans at all metal levels in 2018, rather than being concentrated only on plans at the silver metal level.
The Colorado Division of Insurance clarified that their decision to have insurers spread the cost of CSR across all metal plan premiums (as opposed to just silver plan premiums) was made because the state wasn’t sure that the federal government would accept a silver load strategy. Insurers filed the backup rates in the early summer of 2017, and it wasn’t entirely clear what other states were going to do at that point. Although almost all states ultimately ended up having insurers add the cost of CSR only to silver plan premiums — and the federal government didn’t push back against that strategy — Colorado regulators were afraid that they would end up in a situation where they needed to deploy their backup rates, only to find out that the federal government wouldn’t allow those rates, leaving them with no fallback plan. Hence, the backup plan included adding the cost of CSR to premiums for 2018 plans at all metal levels.
The rate filings are available in SERFF and the SERFF filing numbers are on the Colorado Division of Insurance statement about the approved rates. Some of the filings clearly indicated that a factor in the overall increase was the expected lack of enforcement of the individual mandate (or at least a perception that it wouldn’t be enforced) which insurers expected would lead to fewer people enrolling, and a less healthy risk pool than there would be if the individual mandate were being strongly enforced.
2019: Average increase of 5.6 percent. But because Colorado began allowing insurers to add the cost of CSR to silver plan rates for 2019 (as opposed to spreading the cost across premiums for all plans, the way they did in 2018), premium subsidies grew substantially in 2019. The state noted that while there was an overall average increase of 5.6 percent for unsubsidized premiums, people with premium subsidies who kept the same plan from 2018 to 2019 saw an average decrease of 24 percent in their after-subsidy premiums.
Under Colorado’s new approach to handling the cost of CSR, if the exact same silver plans are also sold off-exchange, they have to include the cost of CSR in their premiums. But as long as the on- and off-exchange silver plans have a difference in benefits, the cost of CSR can be added only to the on-exchange silver plans.
To accomplish this, the Colorado Division of Insurance suggested the insurers could slightly adjust (by $5) the off-exchange ambulance/emergency transportation benefit in order to have a slight difference between the on- and off-exchange plans. The two plans would then have different identification numbers in the Health Insurance Oversight System (HIOS) and could then have differing premiums, with the cost of CSR added to the on-exchange version and not to the off-exchange version. Insurers have the option of using a different approach to creating a slight benefit difference between on- and off-exchange silver plans, but had to discuss the proposal with the Division of Insurance before proceeding.
Connect for Health Colorado projected that two-thirds of subsidy-eligible enrollees would be able to select bronze plans that would be free after 2019 premium subsidies are applied. Although this happened in many other states (here’s an example, from Wyoming) in 2018, it didn’t happen in Colorado in 2018 because the cost of CSR was added to all plan premiums, and not just silver plan premiums. But when Colorado began silver loading the cost of CSR as of 2019, zero-premium bronze plans became available to many enrollees, due to the much larger premium subsidies and the relatively smaller bronze plan prices.
2020: Average premiums decreased by 20 percent, thanks to the state’s new reinsurance program (described above).
2021: Average premiums decreased by 1.4 percent.
Eight insurers offer coverage in Colorado’s exchange in 2021: Anthem (HMO Colorado), Bright, Cigna, Denver Health, Friday Health Plan, Kaiser Permanente, Oscar, and Rocky Mountain Health Plan. Two insurers expanded their coverage areas for 2021. So while there were 22 counties in Colorado (out of 64) where Anthem BCBS was the only insurer offering plans in the exchange in 2020, that dropped to just ten counties in 2021.
Colorado has always had a robust exchange, although most of the insurer participation is concentrated along the I-25 corridor (Colorado Springs, Denver, Fort Collins, etc.). In the mountains and eastern plains, insurer participation has been much more limited. In the first few years of exchange operation, there was some upheaval in terms of insurer participation, but it had leveled out at seven insurers. Oscar Health joined the Colorado exchange in the Denver metro area in 2020, bringing the total number of insurers to eight.
Here’s a look at how carrier participation in Colorado’s exchange has changed over time:
2014: Ten insurers offered individual market plans in Colorado’s exchange in 2014: All Savers, Cigna, Colorado Choice, Colorado Health OP (an ACA-created CO-OP), Denver Health, HMO Colorado (Anthem), Humana, Kaiser, New Health Ventures (Health Access Colorado), and Rocky Mountain Health Plans.
2015: The same ten insurers continued to offer individual market plans in the exchange in 2015.
2016: There were several changes for 2016. New Health Ventures (Health Access Colorado), which had 450 members, dropped out of the market at the end of 2015 after suffering “heavy financial losses.” But most significantly, there were also 82,000 people with CO-OP (Colorado HealthOP) plans who had to pick new plans for 2016, as the CO-OP shut down at the end of 2015.
Colorado HealthOP had by far the lowest premiums in most areas of Colorado in 2015, and particularly for enrollees who don’t receive premium subsidies, the switch to a different carrier meant a sharp increase in premiums for 2016 (in hindsight, the low premiums and generous benefits that the CO-OP offered were clearly unsustainable).
Amid the carrier exits, there was one entrant: UnitedHealthcare of Colorado began offering individual market plans in the state, both on- and off-exchange. Their participation was short-lived, however, as they left the market at the end of 2016.
There were still 75,000 people with grandmothered plans in the individual market in Colorado in 2015, and all of them had to select new coverage for 2016, as grandmothered plans terminated at the end of 2015 in Colorado.
2017: Humana and UnitedHealthcare exited the individual health insurance market in Colorado, both on and off-exchange, at the end of 2016. According to the Colorado Division of Insurance, the carriers’ decisions to leave the individual market impacted about 20,000 people.
Rocky Mountain Health Plans (RMHP, otherwise known as Rocky Mountain HMO) and Anthem BCBS continued to offer plans in the individual market — including in the exchange — in 2017, but their offerings were reduced.
RMHP began offering individual market plans only in Mesa County as of 2017. This is the Grand Junction area, and it’s where RMHP is based. Roughly 10,000 people in other areas of Colorado needed to enroll in new coverage for 2017, as their RMHP coverage ended at the end of 2016. RMHP’s exit from the individual market in the mountains and western slope left many areas in that region with Anthem BCBS as their only on-exchange option starting in 2017.
Anthem continued to offer HMO plans throughout Colorado in 2017 (and continues to do so as of 2019), but they discontinued their PPOs at the end of 2016. There were 62,310 people with Anthem PPOs in the individual market in Colorado in 2016. All of them had to select a new plan for 2017. They still had access to Anthem plans, albeit HMOs.
All together, including Humana, United, RHMP, and Anthem enrollees, more than 92,000 people had to switch plans at the end of 2016.
But Bright Health Insurance was approved by the Colorado Department of Insurance to start offering individual plans on and off the exchange in 2017. Bright was the first new carrier to enter the exchange in Colorado since the exchange opened for business in the fall of 2013. They began offering plans in eight of Colorado’s 64 counties in 2017: Arapahoe, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas, El Paso, Jefferson, and Summit counties (there are 16 zip codes in Boulder County, but Bright Health Insurance was only available in four of them. The other seven counties appeared to have coverage county-wide though).
2018: Colorado Choice, a Colorado non-profit that’s offered coverage for more than four decades, was purchased by Melody Health at the beginning of June 2017 (Melody had planned to offer coverage in Wyoming and Nevada for 2017, but did not get the necessary regulatory approval in time to sell 2017 plans). With the acquisition, Colorado Choice plans began to be marketed as Friday Health Plans for 2018, and are for-profit rather than non-profit. Colorado Choice plans were available in five of Colorado’s nine rating areas in 2017, and that grew to six rating areas for 2018. However, Colorado Choice/Friday Health offered fewer plans in each area in 2018.
Although 14 of Colorado’s 64 counties had just one participating insurer in 2018, almost 95 percent of Connect for Health Colorado’s enrollees lived in areas where there were at least two insurers offering plans, and more than 83 percent of enrollees had three or more insurers from which to choose.
2019: Friday Health expanded into the three remaining rating areas, and joined Anthem in offering coverage in all nine of Colorado’s rating areas (Anthem offers plans in every county, whereas Friday only had partial coverage in three of the nine rating areas; their coverage in the West rating area in 2019 was limited to just two of the 21 counties). Friday’s rate filing indicated that they expected their membership to grow to 10,000 people as a result of their coverage area expansion (by the time they filed their 2020 rate proposal, enrollment stood at 7,293). Pueblo went from having two insurers in the exchange to three, Boulder went from having four to five, and Grand Junction from two to three. Grand Junction is unique in that it’s the only rating area where Rocky Mountain Health Plans offers individual market coverage, and the only rating area where Kaiser did not offer coverage in 2019.
The Division of Insurance published a chart showing the projected change in average after-subsidy premiums (for enrollees who receive premium subsidies) from 2018 to 2019, in each of the state’s nine rating areas, for enrollees who keep the same plan in 2019 than they had in 2018. Overall, there was an average decrease of 24 percent. But in Grand Junction, subsidized enrollees who kept the same plan from 2018 to 2019 ended up with an average premium increase of 38 percent. However, if they were willing to switch to the lowest-cost plan at the same metal level, they saw an average after-subsidy premium decrease of 56 percent.
This is a perfect illustration of how a new insurer entrant can disrupt a market, and how the effect can be both good or bad, depending on your perspective. Friday Health took over the benchmark plan spot in Grand Junction in 2019, with rates that were lower than the benchmark would otherwise have been. That means everyone in that area who received premium subsidies was getting smaller subsidies in 2019 than they would otherwise have received. If they opted to keep the same plan they had in 2018, they may have seen significant average net premium increases, due to the smaller premium subsidies. If they opted to switch to a lower-cost plan in the same metal level (offered by Friday Health), they saw a sharp reduction in their premiums for 2019. But for people with pre-existing conditions, provider networks and drug formularies play a role in determining the feasibility of switching to a new plan.
2020: Oscar Health joined the exchange in the Denver area. All of the other insurers continued to offer plans — although there were some shifts in their coverage areas — so a total of eight insurers are offering plans in Colorado’s exchange in 2020. There are 22 counties in Colorado where Anthem is the only insurer offering plans in the exchange, up from 14 counties in prior years.
Friday Health Plans exited several counties in the eastern part of the state at the end of 2019, although they had no enrollees in any of those six counties. And Kaiser exited the western/mountain area of the state (Kaiser had no enrollees in three of the counties where they exited; curiously, Kaiser’s plans did not appear on the exchange’s plan comparison tool in counties like Routt, even in 2019 when they supposedly offered on-exchange plans in that area). But Bright Health entered Summit County as part of the Peak Health Alliance, preventing that county from dropping to a single insurer.
2021: Rocky Mountain Health Plans and Bright Health expanded their coverage areas for 2021. RMHP expanded into 12 additional counties: Archuletta, Dolores, Garfield, Gunnison, Hinsdale, La Plata, Montezuma, Montrose, Ouray, Pitkin, San Juan, and San Miguel. Bright Health expanded into Dolores, Grand, Lake, La Plata, Montezuma, and San Juan counties. There are only ten counties in Colorado with just a single insurer (Anthem) offering coverage in 2021: Eagle, Jackson, Logan, Moffat, Phillips, Rio Blanco, Routt, Sedgwick, Washington, and Yuma counties.
S.B.132 was signed into law in 2018, and directed the state to conduct an actuarial study on the impact of allowing people over the age of 30 who don’t have hardship exemptions to purchase catastrophic plans. The bill was amended in February 2018 to ensure that the catastrophic plans would only be available through the exchange. The provision requiring that the state conduct an actuarial study and only submit the 1332 waiver if the proposal would not reduce total premium subsidies or increase average premiums was also an amendment (the initial bill would have just directed the state to seek federal approval to expand access to catastrophic plans).
The ACA’s premium subsidies cannot be used for catastrophic plans, so the expansion of catastrophic plans would likely only appeal to healthy people who aren’t eligible for subsidies and are currently paying full price for the cheapest bronze plans they can get (catastrophic plans are generally less expensive than bronze plans because they’re in a separate risk adjustment pool). The legislation stated that if the study found that doing so would not reduce the total amount of premium subsidies provided to Colorado residents, and would not result in higher average individual market premiums, the state would then submit a 1332 waiver to the federal government, seeking permission to allow anyone in Colorado to purchase a catastrophic plan (the ACA limits the sale of these plans to people under age 30, and people who have a hardship exemption from the ACA’s individual mandate).
The state contracted with Wakely for the actuarial analysis, and the results were published in November 2018. Wakely concluded that total premium subsidies would likely increase (by no more than 6.6 percent) during the first year of universally available catastrophic plans. This is because healthier people would be expected to migrate to lower-cost catastrophic plans, leaving a less healthy population in the metal-level plans. That would lead to higher premiums for the metal-level plans, and since premium subsidies are based on the cost of the benchmark silver plan, subsidy amounts are expected to be higher. And since the people switching to catastrophic plans are expected to be those who aren’t eligible for subsidies anyway, they wouldn’t be giving up subsidies (and thus saving the federal government money) with their switch to catastrophic coverage.
The ACA only allows 1332 waivers to be approved if doing so would not increase federal deficits. Since premium subsidies are funded by the federal government, Wakely’s analysis notes that “allowing greater enrollment in Catastrophic plans would not meet the Federal deficit requirement as part of a 1332 waiver.” But in October 2018, CMS issued new guidance for 1332 waivers, noting that although waivers still cannot be approved if they would increase the federal deficit in the long run, it’s now possible for a waiver to be approved if it would result in increased federal spending in a given year, but not overall. In light of this and the result of Colorado’s actuarial study, Colorado Insurance Commissioner Mike Conway sent a letter to CMS in November 2018, asking whether a 1332 waiver to expand access to catastrophic plans would be likely to be gain approval. The state is still awaiting a reply as of 2020.
Information about S.B.132, the actuarial study, and correspondence with CMS can be found here.
S.B.136 was signed into law in 2018. It allows insurance brokers to charge clients a fee if the insurer doesn’t pay a commission. Brokers were not previously allowed to charge any sort of fee, and have historically only been compensated via commissions from insurance carriers (with enrollees paying the same price for their coverage, regardless of whether they use a broker or not).
But some insurers have eliminated broker commissions, resulting in fewer brokers who are willing to work with individual market clients (in the group market, insurers still pay commissions). S.B.136 was designed to ensure that there will continue to be brokers available to serve people who buy coverage in the individual market, although the consumers may have to pay for that assistance themselves.
The Colorado Division of Insurance proposed regulations for broker fees (here and here), which became effective August 8, 2018.
In late 2015, many of the nation’s health insurance carriers began reducing or eliminating broker commissions, mostly for plans sold outside of open enrollment (during special enrollment periods triggered by qualifying events) or for benefit-rich plans at the gold and/or platinum level.
The general consensus was that the commission cuts were an effort by health insurance carriers to limit sales in general, or to limit sales of benefit-rich plans, which tend to be more popular among enrollees who have health conditions, and are more expensive to insure. In 2014 and 2015, eligibility for special enrollment periods was very loosely enforced by Healthcare.gov and some of the state-run exchanges, and carriers noted that healthcare utilization tended to be higher for people who enrolled outside of open enrollment.
In December 2015, Colorado’s Department of Insurance issued a regulatory bulletin (B-4.87) stating that carriers cannot offer “differing commission structures,” which they defined as different commission levels for different metal levels, different commission structures for plans sold during open enrollment versus outside of open enrollment, or “not paying commissions on certain plans offered in the State of Colorado.” The Department of Insurance warned carriers that none of those actions are allowed, and that carriers that utilize differing commission structures would risk “enforcement actions to remedy those violations.”
The purpose of the state’s regulatory bulletin was to protect consumers’ access to the full range of plans available, regardless of whether the consumer is enrolling during open enrollment or as a result of a qualifying event, and regardless of what metal level plan the consumer needs.
Bulletin B-4.87 is still in effect, but some insurers in Colorado have simply switched to a model under which they pay no commissions at all for new enrollments. There’s no “differing commission structure” so the lack of commissions doesn’t run afoul of the regulation. But it does result in fewer brokers being willing to assist people with individual market coverage (commissions are still paid by all insurers for group health insurance plans). After declining in 2017 and 2018, broker commissions have increased again for 2019, as insurers have started to once again be profitable in the individiual market
Colorado has significant disparity in terms of healthcare costs — and thus health insurance premiums — from one area of the state to another. Rates in the mountain areas of the state are far higher than rates along the I-25 corridor, and although subsidies make coverage affordable for people who are eligible, there’s no assistance for someone earning more than 400 percent of the poverty level.
As an example, a 59-year old in Pagosa Springs who earns $50,000/year would have had to pay $1,063/month (25 percent of her income) for the least expensive bronze plan available in the exchange in 2019, and is ineligible for any premium subsidies to make the coverage more affordable (note that if she earned $48,000, she would be eligible for $1,006/month in premium subsidies and could get the least expensive plan for just $56/month; the subsidy cliff is most significant for older applicants in areas where health insurance is expensive).
In an effort to address the disparity, then-Governor Hickenlooper signed HB 1336 into law in May 2016. The bill directed the Colorado Department of Insurance to study the impact of making Colorado one unified rating area, meaning that premiums would rise in the areas where they’re currently lower, and would fall in the mountain areas of the state where they’re currently higher.
The DOI’s report on the impact and viability of a single rating area was presented to the legislative committees in August 2016. The DOI did not recommend that the state become a single rating area, but recommended instead that the state work to find ways to lower the underlying cost of health care, since that’s what drives health insurance premiums. Insurance Commissioner Marguerite Salazar noted that a single rating area strategy could backfire, leading carriers to adjust their plan offerings or even leave the state altogether.
As of 2020, Colorado has nine rating areas (there were 11 prior to 2015, but some areas were combined as of 2015). The District of Columbia uses a single rating area, as do six states: Hawaii, Delaware, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
In March 2016, Governor Hickenlooper signed HB1148 into law. HB1148 gives the legislative oversight committee increased authority to monitor and oversee various aspects of Connect for Health Colorado’s rule-making processes.
The law gives the legislative committee “oversight over rules and policies proposed by the health benefit exchange that affect bidding and awarding contracts, carrier and regulating carrier participation, regulating broker participation and compensation, interacting with other state agencies, managing and compensating the assistance network, or the handling of any type of appeal.”
On October 9, 2015, Colorado HealthOP — the state’s ACA-created CO-OP — joined six other CO-OPs that had already failed (and by the end of 2015, 12 of the original 23 CO-OPs had shut down; as of 2020, there were only four CO-OPs still in operation around the country). The Department of Insurance announced that they had made the difficult decision to decertify Colorado Health OP from the state-run exchange, effectively shutting down the CO-OP.
Although Colorado HealthOP was the seventh CO-OP to fail, they were the first one to publicly disagree with regulators over the shut-down. In their message to members, the CO-OP called the Colorado Division of Insurance’s decision “both irresponsible and premature” and noted that they were “astonished and disappointed by the DOI’s decision”. The CO-OP had said just the day before that they had three viable solutions for funding, and they noted that they had presented them to the DOI earlier in the week.
Colorado Health OP had said that they were on track to pay back their federal start-up loans in full and ahead of schedule, but that was derailed by the announcement on October 1 that risk corridor payments would be just 12.6 percent of the amount owed to each carrier. The Colorado Division of Insurance explained that although the CO-OP had been under DOI supervision for most of 2015, the carrier had been meeting their reserve requirements until October. But the risk corridor shortfall meant that “the Colorado HealthOP’s rainy day fund will be completely wiped out, and is in fact expected to be in the negative by $34 million by the end of the year [2015].” Because of this, the DOI felt they had no option other than to decertify Colorado Health OP from the exchange.
In a last-ditch effort to be allowed to participate in the 2016 open enrollment, Colorado HealthOP filed a lawsuit in Denver District Court on October 19, requesting an injunction and temporary restraining order against then-Insurance Commissioner Marguerite Salazar. But by the end of the day, following a closed-door court hearing, the case had been withdrawn (and suppressed by the court) and the CO-OP had agreed to begin the process of winding down their operations by the end of the year.
Colorado HealthOP had about 80,000 people enrolled in individual plans in 2015. All of those members had to sign up for new coverage for 2016. There were also almost 3,000 members enrolled in small group plans, and initially, the plan was that they would have to switch to new plans as of their next renewal date. But on November 17, Colorado Insurance Commissioner Marguerite Salazar announced that Colorado HealthOP’s small business plans would also terminate as of December 31, and small businesses with Colorado HealthOP plans had to secure coverage with a different carrier for 2016.
Supporters of universal healthcare in Colorado worked for months to gather signatures in support of ColoradoCare, a universal coverage system that would have gone into effect in 2019 if voters had approved it in the 2016 election. But voters resoundingly rejected the measure, with just 21 percent in favor, and 79 percent opposed.
ColoradoCare would have been enacted using a 1332 waiver under the ACA, which allows states to chart their own course for healthcare reform, as long as they do so in a way that covers at least as many people as the ACA would have, keeps coverage affordable and at least as comprehensive as it would be under the ACA, and doesn’t increase the federal deficit.
If those general guidelines are satisfied, the state can receive funding from the federal government equal to what would have been provided to the state’s residents in premium tax credits, cost-sharing subsidies, and small business tax credits. In Colorado, those funds, together with Medicaid waiver funds, were projected to total $11.6 billion in 2019. Total costs to run a zero-deductible, universal coverage program in Colorado were estimated at $35.6 billion for 2019. The $25 billion difference would have been generated through a 10% income tax. Employees would have paid only a third of the total tax, with their employers kicking in the remaining two-thirds (ie, employees would have paid 3.33 percent of their gross pay).
The Colorado Division of Insurance announced that transitional or “grandmothered” health plans had to be discontinued at the end of 2015. As of 2016, all individual and small-group plans in the state were either fully ACA-compliant, or grandfathered (effective dates prior to March 23, 2010).
Despite the fact that many other states are still allowing grandmothered plans to remain in force, there was controversy in Colorado over the fact that grandmothered plans were allowed to renew at all after January 1, 2014. Lawmakers in Colorado passed a bill in 2013 (House Bill 13-1266) that aligned Colorado healthcare law with the ACA. It required Colorado plans to be compliant with the ACA as of their issue or renewal date starting on January 1, 2014. Ultimately, the Division of Insurance used their regulatory power (also provided for in HB 1266) to allow the renewal of grandmothered plans in 2014, but there were questions as to whether or not they overstepped their bounds in doing so.
Then-Governor John Hickenlooper informed the federal government in October 2012 that Colorado intended to run its own health insurance marketplace, and the state received federal approval of its plan in December 2012.
Unlike politicians in most other states, Colorado legislators voted on a bipartisan basis to move ahead with a state-run exchange. Legislation to establish the state marketplace passed in May 2011 and was signed by Hickenlooper in June 2011. In early 2013, the marketplace was given the brand name “Connect for Health Colorado.”
Colorado’s marketplace is governed by a 12-member board (nine voting and three ex-officio) and led by CEO Kevin Patterson.
Connect for Health Colorado
855-PLANS-4-YOU (855-752-6749)
State Exchange Profile: Colorado
The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation overview of Colorado’s progress toward creating a state health insurance exchange.
Louise Norris is an individual health insurance broker who has been writing about health insurance and health reform since 2006. She has written dozens of opinions and educational pieces about the Affordable Care Act for healthinsurance.org. Her state health exchange updates are regularly cited by media who cover health reform and by other health insurance experts.
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