Issues with government subsidies for insurance benefits found

More than 1 million Americans may have received the wrong amount in federal assistance when they purchased health insurance benefits through the federal or state marketplaces.

According to The Washington Post, the many people’s incomes were wrongly listed on their health insurance applications, either being too low or too high in amount, causing them to receive subsidies for an inaccurate income level. While these issues have been found, the Post reported the federal government continues to pay the subsidies because it is currently hitting roadblocks to fix the problem. According to Fox News, the government lacks the technology to evaluate and match incomes with applications, which may be one of the best ways of verifying subsidy amounts.

Julie Bataille, communications director for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said, according to the Post, that the government is doing what it can to ensure people receive the tax credits they need – it may just take a while to do so.

“While most data matched up right away [in the marketplaces] during the application process, we take seriously the cases that require more work and have a system in place to expeditiously resolve these data inconsistencies,” Bataille said.