Some Maine residents who work for larger employers are expected to receive $2.6 million in rebates from insurance companies this summer as a result of the federal health reform law.
The rebates will benefit 10,600 individuals in Maine, according to a press release from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The average benefit for the 5,600 Maine families receiving the rebates will be $463.
The premium rebates are part of more than $1.1 billion that will be paid out to nearly 13 million Americans under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
The health reform law requires health insurers to spend at least 80 cents of every premium dollar on medical care and quality improvement. The other 20 cents can go to administrative costs.
Insurers that don’t meet this so-called “80/20 rule” must send their customers a rebate for the difference no later than Aug. 1. Insurance companies are required to notify policyholders whether they have met the 80/20 rule and, if not, how much of a rebate they will receive.
Unlike most other states, Maine will see rebates paid out only by insurers offering policies through the large group market, which serves bigger employers. Insurers dedicated to the individual market, or people who buy health insurance on their own, were exempted from the 80/20 rule last year.
The federal government granted insurers a waiver, holding the spending at Maine’s existing rate, which requires 65 cents of every premium dollar to go toward medical costs.
Former insurance superintendent Mila Kofman requested the waiver after Megalife, one of just three health insurance companies that sells individual, nongroup coverage in Maine, indicated it might leave the market in Maine if the 80/20 rule was implemented.
The rebates to Maine consumers will be sent to the employer administering their insurance plan. The money must then be transferred directly to the employee or used to offset their health care costs.
Congressman Mike Michaud praised the HHS announcement.
“Health premiums should reflect how much insurance companies are actually spending on care, and this provision will provide relief to Mainers who have seen their insurance costs skyrocket while their health care services stay the same,” he said in a statement.
The fate of the federal health reform law, including the rebate provision, are tied to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the law’s constitutionality. The court is expected to issue a ruling next week.
While princess mike’s top of the line health insurance is being paid for by you and I.
I’ve already received one rebate on my health insurance this year because of Obamacare. It is great to finally get some relief. No wonder insurance companies don’t like it.
Kind of ironic! LePage is using your money to fight against a Healthcare Act which gives you money back
I wonder if you will be made to pay it back after SCOUS strikes it down next week. I wouldn’t be surprised if they go after folks for reimbursement.
Has anyone else on here actually received a rebate from their health insurance company? I have heard the talk but do not know anyone who has actually received anything at this point. Just asking.
Look at the numbers. It is about .7% of the people in maine will benefit from this. Probably state employees because they have the best insurance in the state because you and I are paying for it.
The state plan is self-insured.
No rebates.
I never cease to be amazed at the depth and breadth of ignorance in this state. Clearly you are jealous of state employees because they managed to get a job that has a decent salary and real benefits. By the way, if your employer provided YOU with insurance anyone doing business with your employer would be paying for YOUR insurance.
This is what the insurance companies fought for. They like it a lot, don’t be fooled. They are now allowed to increase rates faster than they ever have according to these new laws. And they are. My company now requires a deductable, and the rates have skyrocketed. I can no longer afford to go to the doctor, but I am paying a lot more for the privledge of getting less health care.
The GOP alternative to “Obamacare is:
DON’T CARE
You can’t pay for health care?
DON’T CARE
Don’t have a job with benefits?
DON’T CARE
Gonna lose everything to care for your wife/child/parent?
DON’T CARE
Have a pre-existing condition?
DON’T CARE
Have to make a choice between meds and food?
DON’T CARE
Actually, you’re quite incorrect. With what is currently happening there will be a greater number of people that can no longer afford health care. I would suggest people like you are the ones that don’t care. As long as you get your “free” services you don’t care how it affects other people. I make well under the Maine state average for wages. My insurance used to be provided for free and I had no deductable. Now nearly 1/5 of my weekly wages are spent for insurance and I can no longer afford to see a doctor because only insurance with deductables are offered. How can anyone see this as moving forward?
I don’t get any free services or free health care, you know that old saying about the word assume.
My guess is that it sucks to be you since you didn’t bother to get the training or education to get a better job; after all, isn’t that what you TeaParty Personal Responsibility folks whine about all the time-if you want something YOU HAVE TO EARN IT? Where’s YOUR personal responsibility, especially since you claim to have had free insurance-the same thing that you’re bashing the writer about.
Actually they recommend dying fast if you are really sick.
My insurance premiums have gone down and coverage has improved. With the 80/20 rule under Obamacare, insurance companies have to spent 80% of collected premiums on health care or rebate the difference to policy holders. They can use the remaining 20% as they see fit.
And that has nothing to do with obamacare. It’s LePage and the republicans in who changed the law and caused these rates hikes. pay attention.
Yay, for the Health Care Reform Act! Wake up folks and vote for people who take the money back from big anti-people corporations.
Thousands of pages of pure crapola….you should wake up…LOL
Obama care is draining my paycheck. My insurance cost has gone way up and now I have a dedutable that I need to pay on top of that. This is costing me on average $200 dollars every pay period now. Why do I even have insurance, health care has never cost this much.
You simply don’t get it do you. Insurance premiums paid to “for-profit” insurance companies along with the deductible requirements are always going to go up. The only way to stop the rape of our healthcare dollars is to end for-profit healthcare and go to a national healthcare plan which covers ALL Americans.
I get it. People should pay their own way. Not expect everyone else to pay for it. Insurance is not being used for its intended purpose of unexpected circumstances. It is being utilized for health care. I think that we have regulated ourselves into a corner and that is driving up costs. When people don’t see the up front cost of something it destroys a market and we see huge increases in cost. This is the problem with insurance, there is no apparent impact to the end user. People over utilize the service and all of a sudden we have a system that no one can afford.
I get it. You just want to let people die if they get sick.
I’m sorry but you don’t get it at all.
Like Canada. Where people die waiting for heart bypass surgery. You nationalizing healthcare advocate don’t know what your talking about.
http://www.aarp.org/politics-society/government-elections/info-03-2012/myths-canada-health-care.3.html
Get informed.
You are mistaken. Gosh how many times must this be explained!!!! The Canadian healthcare system works quite nicely thank you. People do not die because they cannot get medication, people don’t die because they cannot afford long term care, people don’t die because the health insurance companies won’t pay for a procedure or their benefit limit has been reached. Canadians do not die because they must wait for essential surgery. I have relatives in Canada who, being familiar with the American system, much prefer the Canadian system. In fact my friend, Canadians live longer than Americans! Think about that fact, which it is, instead of the popular myth perpetrated by the GOP that says something different. Good grief!
Obama care has nothing to do with your current cost.
The Governor and GOP majority in our Legislature CHANGED the small group (50 employees or less) insurance laws to allow increasingly larger variations in rates. This is being phased in through 2014 when Obama care will make this new law UNLAWFUL So right now in Maine, older people and rural areas are getting significant rate hikes. Thank the Governor and the TB Legislature for this.
You do understand that what people call Obama care was the idea of the very conservative Heritage Foundation and was always supported by the insurance industry don’t you?
Or maybe you don’t?
A friend that has a small businees said that her insurance for her employees went up 30% and higher deductibles under lepages insurance plan. It has nothing to do with Obama care. Insurance companies have been raising rates for years.
WRONG! Thanks for playing and pick up your parting gifts on the way OUT THE DOOR. Your rates were on the way up LONG BEFORE Obamacare was passed. Too bad you’re just another TeaPublican who wouldn’t know a FACT if it bit him on the thinker!
Thank you President Obama, Senators Collins and Snowe for supporting Obamacare.
The fact that more than 20% of premiums goes to the insurance company and not to claims is a multibillion dolalr scandal that wll ow begin to end.
and of course now the insurance companies will increase premiums to retain the same level of profit taking under the new percentages set forth….you actually think you are going to make out on this deal?
LOL!! Let’s see how you feel when your premiums increase by 10 to 30% annually over the next few years….your little 500 dollar kickback is nothing but a carrot laced with a tranquilizing agent dangled in the faces of easily manipulated minds….sadly you’ve eaten the carrot and are now set up to lose your $500 bump ten-fold over the next few years….and your practically begging for it…how brilliant!!
but hey, rest assured, Obama and his crony insurance pals will laugh all the way to bank with your premium increases over the next few years…..at least your support helped out the latest attempt at a new aristocracy…
Thats why we need a single payer government Medicare for everyone.
Peoples health and lives shouldn’t be held hostage by a bunch of greedy capitalists!
Right on my friend, right on!
The premium increases they are forcing every Amerikan to pay.
I don’t understand why you blame Obama for this it was Romney’s idea to have his Mass. plan
for the whole country, then his people helped write the program. Gee try to keep up. Of course the Flip flopper in chief has changed his mind or just doesn’t want to talk about it but that is typical Romney. God I wish he would find something he likes and stay with it, but that is for another discussion
That’s why a single payor arrangement, like Medicare is a good thing.
Medicare administration costs 3 to 4 %.
Don’t be fooled!
Who cares if Mega Health Insurance leaves Maine, they just collect from customers and don’t pay for much of anything! Their prevailing rates are a joke!
Thats just great isn’t it!!!?? Obamacare drives the cost of health care up so your paying around $1000 more dollars a year for your health insurance. Some people get some of that money back. Make them think Obama care is great but the fact is they are still paying more for health care and they have less coverage!
$1000 more a year? Try $6500 more a year including forced deductables and higher premiums now.
I guess you were paying the same price for many years before Obamacare, never had an increase. Boy were you lucky most others had continuous increases year after year, I know I did before retirement and even my supplemental has been going up even before Obamacare.
Some Maine residents who work for larger employers are expected to receive $2.6 million in rebates from insurance companies this summer as a result of the federal health reform law.
This seems to be a recurring theme doesnt it? Big Business, Bigger Corporations, Huge Profits, and wow, they are actually giving 500.00 bucks back..Well that should cover food for a family of five for about…3 weeks…Yay!!!!
My insurance costs have gone up ~$6500 a year when both deductables and price are figured in. If .7% of the population is getting a rebate and the average persons costs have gone up like mine, I don’t think this rebate is going to affect anyone but state employees or the very wealthy that don’t really need it anyway. The rebate is just a feel good scam as they steal more of our money.
Throw the sheep a bone just before election
and make them think they are getting something
wonderful.
Try reading the article, old man.
I can’t read…I am a democrat.
What are you talking about ? Evidently you think you know what you’re talking about but clearly you don’t know what you’re talking about.
You are absolutely correct….forgive me, I am a democrat.
I think you’re just not well informed at all on the matter.
P S -Your party membership is irrelevant.
This is chump change. The CEO of United Health made $48 million last year. And this is annual. Obamacare is not the answer. Sorry to wreck your liberal buzz.
The GOP alternative to “Obamacare is:
DON’T CARE
You can’t pay for health care?
DON’T CARE
Don’t have a job with benefits?
DON’T CARE
Gonna lose everything to care for your wife/child/parent?
DON’T CARE
Have a pre-existing condition?
DON’T CARE
Have to make a choice between meds and food?
DON’T CARE
All true.
I guess people cant read. Some are so wrapped up in the GOP’s rhetoric that they cant see past anything else.. First off the rebate checks are because they have charged too much.. When all this came out the insurance companies started raising their premiums. This is the rebate we are getting back..
“””””Insurers that don’t meet this so-called “80/20 rule” must send their
customers a rebate for the difference no later than Aug. 1. Insurance
companies are required to notify policyholders whether they have met the
80/20 rule and, if not, how much of a rebate they will receive.””””” “”””The health reform law requires health insurers to spend at least 80
cents of every premium dollar on medical care and quality improvement.
The other 20 cents can go to administrative costs.””””” This curbs what they can charge for insurance premiums.. Wake up this is a good thing.. There has been too much bloating of our premiums making the big insurance companies rich with record breaking profits.. This will curb their profit margin considerably.. It is in plain language in this article.. If this law passes the premiums that many of us are paying will have to go down.. This is what most people that follow the rhetoric of the GOP don’t understand. The people that respond to this and try to correct me are gonna be the die hard Republicans who cant follow the directions on a tooth pick box.. What gets me is people are saying that Obama care is the worst thing to have.. Lol Who started this thing? It was a Republican his name is Mitt Romney he implemented this in Mass. and it was a success.. But when a Democrat wanted to do it then it was all a bad idea.. The only thing that i don’t like about Obama care is that you have to do it or pay a fine. That’s the wrong part you should not have to pay a fine but you should have to do it.. If everyone would get on board with this program then insurance rates could be as low as anyone has ever seen.. Like anything else the big insurance companies started charging more and paying out less when their income became threatened.. This is called gouging, they should be brought to their knees for this.. But there was no regulations imposed before Obama care came around. This will regulate what kind of profits they make.. Why cant you see this people.. Also there are provisions on what they pay they will have to cover preexisting conditions and will have to cover more procedures than they do now.. Every ones deductible will be the same etc etc.. I for one think it is a good thing.. There are a bunch of kinks in the program but with time it will iron itself out with closer government scrutiny.
For some reason these 2 comments ended up here rather than in response to an earlier comment.
misplaced comment.
Are they rebates or are they returning overcharges?