Improvement Seen in Health Insurance Sign Up

As the online facilities improve people are more relaxed once they can check all the options and then enroll.

Special aides find that the efforts to sign up Kenosha County residents under The Affordable Care Act are showing signs of improvement.

Due to the technical glitches the slow process is now improving according to Jessica Retzlaff, a certified application counselor at The Kenosha Community Health Center.

Health Insurance
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“It has significantly improved since Oct. 1. We couldn’t even create an account page, and now we can make accounts for people,” Retzlaff said. The time has now decreased from 2 hours to ½ hour now. It can now be accessed by anyone. Around 90,000 people so far covered by Badger Care have received letters from the state about their covers changing from Badger Care to state coverage for the next year.

Adelene Greene, director of the county’s Division of Workforce Development at the Job Center. “Our economic support staff will be responsible for the BadgerCare Plus clients who become newly eligible or are losing eligibility and transitioning to the marketplace based on the new federal poverty level standards for BadgerCare Plus,” she said. “The state estimates approximately 7,000 cases in Kenosha will be impacted.” Health “navigators” in and around the community who are federally funded through the Affordable Care Act are also expected to assist residents, she said.

Greene said, so far, the county has not had many from the public inquire about signing up via the marketplace website. Health care “navigators” in and around the community who are federally funded through the Affordable Care Act are also expected to assist residents, she said. The county and the health center are contacting navigators to establish a network of contacts to ensure people who need to sign up can receive coverage. So far, they have not been able determine how many navigators are available.

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The deadline for people who need insurance is Dec. 15 if they want coverage to begin Jan. 1. The deadline for coverage without penalty is March 15th. Open enrolment for the year closes on March 31st. “We are predicting a much larger caseload as these progresses,” said Stuligross. He added that he and other certified application counselors will be attending more community events to promote signing up for health insurance.

“We are anticipating (helping) several hundred people until the end of March.” Residents can sign up online at The Health Insurance marketplace, or by using paper forms, the helpline number can be used or the Kenosha Health Center can be contacted.