Federal High Risk Pools : Health Reform Updates
Federal High Risk Health Pools Are Coming To Your State!
I noticed a note on the Texas High Risk Health Pool website when I was doing some research for a client.
Enrollees in the new federal pool program will pay standard market premium rates and their coverage will not be subject to any preexisting condition exclusion. Funds for the Federal Pool are limited, so eligible applicants should apply as soon as possible.
Federal High Risk Health Plans
What I took away from this is that, for now, the federal plan is being implemented, but will work in conjunction with the state risk pool. I get the idea that the premiums will be a bit lower, but that limited slots are open. I guess it will work on a first come/first served basis.
Now, as you may know if you are interested in health insurance risk pools, is that every state has their own way of handling individuals who have been declined for private major medical insurance. Apparently the federal plan is also being implemented on a state by state basis too. The point of this is that you need to check with your own state’s high risk plan, and the Texas website is just an example. This is the federal high risk health pool website.
What Are High Risk Health Pools?
Individual insurers can decline applicants if they do not meet the plan underwriting criteria. These declines may qualify for a state plan that covered “high risk” underwriting cases. Not everybody qualified, and the premium, in some states, was fairly high.
It is beyond the scope of this article to outline the requirements for every state, but it should be simple for you to find the website for your own state plan. However, let me list of of the federal plan requirements.
- You must be lawfully present in the US. This is defined as a US citizen or national. The federal website has a list of documents that you must present in order to prove this.
- You must have been uninsured for at least 6 months. I’m not sure why they have this requirement.
- You must have had a problem getting private coverage because of a pre-existing condition. This plan is not for fairly healthy people who could qualify for individual health insurance! You can visit the link in the previous statement to find individual health insurance plans in your local area. It only takes a few moments to fill our the quote form, and it can put you in touch with competitive health insurance companies in your local area. They will have the information you need.
There is also a placce on the website to find your state high risk pool. There are some individual state rules too. I know this sounds complicated, but traditionally, most insurance is regulated by states, and not the federal government. That’s why I suggested looking for your own state website.
Advantages of The Federal Health Pool
I think the plan will come in cheaper than many state plans. I cannot really go into more details, because as it says on the federal website, the plans will vary by state! For my own state, it looks like the federal plan has less qualifications and lower premiums.
Good Luck!
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Hopefully this will end a lot of misery. One of the biggest problems has always been insuring people who are already sick – even controlled diabetes will get a decline with most insurers so what are these people giong to do? Again, I hope this is good news and works better than the current mess.