Another big California health insurer has stunned individual policyholders with huge rate increases — this time it's Blue Shield of California seeking cumulative hikes of as much as 59% for tens of thousands of customers March 1.
Blue Shield's action comes less than a year after Anthem Blue Cross tried and failed to raise rates as much as 39% for about 700,000 California customers.
San Francisco-based Blue Shield said the increases were the result of fast-rising healthcare costs and other expenses resulting from new healthcare laws.
"We raise rates only when absolutely necessary to pay the accelerating cost of medical care for our members," the nonprofit insurer told customers last month.
In all, Blue Shield said, 193,000 policyholders would see increases averaging 30% to 35%, the result of three separate rate hikes since October.
Nearly 1 in 4 of the affected customers will see cumulative increases of more than 50% over five months.
While most policyholders received separate notices for the successive rate hikes, others were given the news all at once because they had contracts guaranteeing their rate for a year, Blue Shield spokesman Tom Epstein said.
Michael Fraser, a Blue Shield policyholder from San Diego, learned recently that his monthly bill would climb 59%, to $431 from $271.
"When I tell people, their jaws drop and their eyes bug out," said Fraser, 53, a freelance advertising writer. "The amount is stunning."
It's a lot more than stunning, it's ridiculous. Considering the recession slowed the rate of health care spending to the slowest increase in 50 years in 2009, jacking up premiums is just an excuse for insurance companies to fleece customers while they try to recover from their own bad investments (Remember AIG? It was far from the only insurance company that made bad investments in the last four years.)
This is insurance companies trying to lock in as high rates as possible before state insurance exchanges kick in and provide competition.
Pretty repugnant.
Considering the recession slowed the rate of health care spending to the slowest increase in 50 years in 2009, jacking up premiums is just an excuse for insurance companies to fleece customers while they try to recover from their own bad investments...
ReplyDeleteI'll bet you didn't know that Blue Shield is a not-for-profit company, did you? So if they aren't raising the rates to increase the profit margin, they must be raising the rates for some other reason. You know, for covering things like the large increasing costs Blue Shield will have to incur when Obamacare fully kicks in. I'm guessing they, like most Americans, don't believe the rosy picture Obama painted about how his plan is going to reduce health care costs. And I'm guessing they don't believe Obama because they know he, Democrats, and liberal puppets lied through their teeth about how much money would be saved by Obamacare.
Look who is back in town baby!
ReplyDeleteLike I said, every time I get a chance to believe in a loving god, you people come around. IT's pretty convienent, I like being an atheist.
ReplyDelete