This will cause an earthquake in the Philly Medicare Advantage market which IBC dominates. If you are a Medicare Advantage or Medicare Supplement agent in the 5-County Philly area, you better get ready!!
This announcement from IBC will directly impact 37,285 of IBC members as they will be disenrolled as of 1/1/10 (19,572 dually eligibles and 17,713 who are on “low premium” options). MORE IMPORTANTLY, it also portends changes for the other 85,364 IBC HMO members who have IBC’s other Medicare HMO plans (Keystone 65 Preferred, Advantage and Group) which will continue to be offered, but where IBC will likely impose strong premium and benefit actions. In addition, IBC has 14,748 members in it’s Personal Choice 65 Medicare Advantage Local PPO who will, likely, be impacted as well. That’s 137,397 members in all (in just 5 counties, mind you!) (Source: CMS, July, 2009 Enrollment data)
Kathleen Sebelius and Arlen Specter paid a visit to Philadelphia last week (see video below). Ironically, the $177 Billion in Medicare Advantage cuts which are being proposed to be used to fund Health Insurance for the uninsured is coming on the backs of Seniors (“poor” Seniors, according to the Inquirer) like those in the IBC plans (see linked article, “No Reduced Medicare Benefits in Healthcare Reform” and my blog post which dissects where the $177 Billion REALLY comes from. . .and this is just one part of the $500 Billion in cuts over 10 years from the Medicare program). Good thing for Sebelius and Specter that they didn’t arrive in Philly after these disenrollments were announced or they really would have heard from some angry constitiuents. IBC is a non-profit, so it’s hard to argue that the “excess payments” are going to profits. Also, recently the PA DOI reported on IBC’s CEO compensation and found it to be reasonable with the compensation of other non-profits, so you can’t really argue it’s going to Executive compensation, either. So, who is really paying the price for these cuts?
PS – Please don’t report me to flag@whitehouse.gov. I hope this isn’t considered “fishy”! (See White House Blog post encouraging you to report “fishy” websites!)
Since Keystone has announced they will discontinue their Keystone Medicare “Value” and “Dual Eligible” (65 Complete) plans as of Jan. 1st 2010 the best option may be Aetna Medicare, or for those under 65 compare Aetna Individual Health Plans . This is a byproduct of Healthcare reform and seniors should remain vigilant in voicing their concerns.
The $64,000 question will be what does the competition do? If IBC doesn’t want the “dually eligible” customer base will Aetna Medicare want to take on this group? The other 17,000 in the Value plan will come down to plan design and premium. As long as those 17000 are still customers IBC can call them until 12/31. It will be interesting to see both Aetna’s and IBC’s 2010 plan design. Certainly IBC will be proactive recruiting exiting enrollees for their 2010 plans. It will be interesting.
Alan:
Thanks for the comment and link!
Craig
Craig -
Excellent insight regarding the Medicare Advantage plans exiting the PA market. With WellCare and Coventry also exiting the PFFS markets there will be at least another 400,000+ enrollees shopping for new MA plans.
Related to H.R.3200 – America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, it’s ironic that the provision to eliminate the January-March open enrollment will restrict seniors from making choices (switching) that they have always enjoyed. So much for the “affordable health choices.”
In case you haven’t seen the OpenCongress website — http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h3200/show# — it’s worth noting that among nearly 2,500 visitors only 15% support HB 3200!