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December 23, 2015 at 10:52 AM
Guy Furay, a South Carolina health insurance broker, is trying to sell other agents, brokers and benefits consultants on doing more to support S. 1661, a bill that could get producer compensation of health insurer medical loss ratio (MLR) calculations.
Furay, a member of the National Association of Health Underwriters (NAHU), is sending every U.S. senator a letter in support of S. 1661, and he’s hoping other health insurance producers will do the same.
Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., introduced the bill in June, along with Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del.
The Senate referred the bill to its Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., came aboard as a cosponsor in September.
President Obama has just signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016 (CAA) bill. The CAA bill postponed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) Cadillac plan excise tax for two years, postponed the start date of the PPACA medical device excise tax, given health insurers a $13.9 billion break on PPACA health insurer tax bills, and heaped new reporting requirements on the agencies that run the big PPACA commercial health insurance programs.
But the tens of thousands of active health insurance producers in the country have not had any luck with persuading the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to change the PPACA MLR formula.
The Senate HELP Committee has let S. 1661 gather dust.
See also: California broker to NAHU: Fight ‘abysmal state of affairs’
PPACA now requires insurers to spend at least 85 percent of large-group revenue and 80 percent of individual and small-group revenue on health care and quality improvement efforts.
Advocates of the minimum MLR system say it encourages insurers to be more efficient. Some defenders of the current system say the effects on producer comp have not been that great, and, earlier this year, some health coverage distributors were saying they had seen signs of the producer comp picture improving.
