It’s official! CMS announced a few hours ago that they will be REVERSING their prior guidance and ALL 2009 enrollments into Medicare Advantage from Original Medicare and a PDP will be paid INITIAL commission.
CMS will be issuing clarification about the implementation and timing of the new files, but the new guidance on 2009 is 100% clear!
Craig and to all for that matter,
has anyone heard anything about Universal (Today’s Options/Pyramid-) recieving the file and planning on paying out.
They vowed to fight for us (agents) to get the full commisions and to keep us posted and i have heard nothing from them since they said they were “disputing” the file on behalf of the agents.
Any info would be greatly appreciated.
thank you
All the largere companies I work for, UHC, Coventry, Wellcare, Humana all put out an email blast a few weeks ago that the ruling had been reversed and we would be getting paid full commission on people coming from Original Medicare who had a PDP that were enrolling in a MA or MAPD plan for the first time.
Only UHC has said a specific timeline for paying us which I believe they said is early August for everyone enrolled during AEP.
The other companies I wrote for have not elaborated further other than the initial email I just mentioned.
Humana says they will now pay you by September. They did not say which year
When I checked App Tracker tonite for any commissions for Coventry/Health America (PA) I note a process dated 8/1/2009 which appears to be paying the True-Up NEW commissions through to June 2009. It appears accurate from my initial review. I am on direct deposit so I do not have the dollars yet but expect they will be in our account by the middle of this week. Just thought I’d throw this out there for anyone else out there waiting and wondering and to see if others are seeing the same thing. I am printing the statement now to review in more detail and be sure that I am correct. Many thanks to Craig!!!
I have not received any word from UA….if anyone has an update it would be appreciated.
Randy:
I’ll check with UA on status of Initial Commissions for Jan through June.
Craig
Randy:
I’m hearing that initial commissions with UA will be released mid week next week. On or around 8/19.
Craig
Craig,
Thank you so much for the follow up!
4:03 email from UHN>>>>>> files are in for AEP. Payment expected 8/3/09.
Thanks Craig for all the support; and we are going to make some $$$ when I contract with you for my Med-Sup BIZ.
Ok.. I did not get an email about receiving the new files..Has anyone gotten any news?
Emails from:
Aetna – CMS has requested additional information from them that they may need to go back to the customer to get, before their file will be released
United HealthCare – received the file last week, due to it’s size they estimate payment to go out the 2nd wk in August.
Coventry (Health America) – no word
Don’t even want to get intohow upsetting all this waiting is.
Sent requests for help to my 2 US Senators in PA & area US Congressman for PA. 1 Senator was told by CMS it was not CMS’s responsibility as we are paid by the health plan – passing the buck and the buck stops with CMS. I am urging them to have CMS change back to letting the health plans pay us from their records like they have pre-2009.
We need to all join an insurance union to deal with CMS for us if we plan to continue to offer these plans to our customers. Many of our customers need these plans, but I have been working for nothing for months and for 1/2 pay the entire year. Can not continue to do it this way.
LaToya are you contracted with UNH?
I did not recieve an e-mail from CMS saying the files were available. I saw a posting here that said someone had received files so I had our Medicare financial analyst do some digging and she found the files for me. We have now received the Jan-June files from CMS. Hope this helps some.
I work on calculation the commissions that you receive for a health insurance company in WI.
I spoke with a WellCare Representative Yesterday…The insurance companies have received the files from CMS.
However, although WellCare Sent out This Email…
CMS Clarifies Criteria For Initial Compensation Qualifiers
As a result of feedback from Medicare Advantage Plans with respect to information included in CMS’ June 5th memo that discussed criteria for paying initial (1st year, 2 X payment) compensation fees in 2009, CMS issued the following clarification memo on June 26, 2009:
“Independent producers enrolling beneficiaries with Original Medicare and a PDP into an MA plan or MA-PD, and vice versa, should be paid an initial compensation for any such enrollments with effective dates in 2009.”
We are pleased with this clarification, and are waiting for updated and corrected reports from CMS so we can pay out this commission. We are committed to distributing these commissions to producers as soon as possible , and we are currently working with our Commission Team to ensure we are ready to process these payments to be included in the month-end check run immediately following the CMS release of updated reports.
Thank you for your continued patience.
OKAY…So now they still don’t know if we are going to be paid this month….my contact said she doubt that they will process so quickly.. Since WellCare does not pay but once a month…I guess we will have to wait until September 1 to get paid…
This is just not right.
A Coventry Supervisor in Commissions stated they are paying out tomorrow.
Seeing, is believing! When I get something tangible, I won’t be skeptical. Until then, “Show me the money!” (Of course, the bill collectors are thinking the same thing).
Hot off the presses….
CMS Release Files! Your Money is Coming.
FINALLY, without any type of formal communication, CMS started sending the files to the insurance companies today. The companies will start to pay in the next two weeks. You’ll see emails from the companies in the next few days.
No commissions here. All I hear is that they are working on it and waiting for more files.
I have a feeling that we won’t get paid untill late Sept and that they will want us to spend our commissions on co-op direct mail leads for 2010. They’re NutZ. They only way I would sell this is if the marketing was FREE.
How do they expect us to really be excited and want to sell for 2010. We are still waiting to be paid for 2008 and 2009. This was my first and last year selling Medicare Advantage.
Has anyone heard any new news on our commissions?
Latoya,
I sold for United Health Care, Coventry, and Wellcare and a few small regional companies. UHC, Coventry and Wellcare said they will be paying on someone that had OM and a PDP but no payments as of yet. Rumor has it the end of July they will start paying… Keep your fingers crossed.