Helping Clients with Part D Can Be a Violation

[DS4]

CMS: Mr Sayer, you have violated the CMS marketing rules, and, as of today, you are no longer certified to market and sell MA or Part D plans.

Me: Praise the baby Jesus!!!!

 

[yorkriver1]

What about using incognito mode in chrome to do so? I dint know if that blocks the IP but just a thought?

I used incognito mode to keep moving when in web broker portal mode at open enrollment, instead of clearing cookies. Jammed up when I didn't do one of those things. May not work so well for the issue of this thread.

Chrome's disclaimer for incognito browser:
"Going incognito doesn’t hide your browsing from your employer, your internet service provider, or the websites you visit."

So, the "websites you visit" could include the carrier, like in GreenSky's example.

The rest of disclaimer: "Pages you view in incognito tabs won’t stick around in your browser’s history, cookie store, or search history after you’ve closed all of your incognito tabs. Any files you download or bookmarks you create will be kept. Learn more about incognito browsing:" https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/95464?p=incognito&rd=1#incognito

 

[somarco]

Incognito supposedly prevents your spouse from seeing the places you go when they check your browsing history.

It does nothing to protect you from the site tracking devices.

 

[yogooglethis]

I can answer the first one. As someone stated earlier, you can talk Part C and Part D all day long if you're not contracted for it. You can give all the advice, good and bad, and never suffer any consequences whatsoever.

Even if the above where not true and I didn't have a contract for either I would tell CMS to take a hike if they said something. But that's just it, CMS won't usually correspond with the agent. They do it all through the carriers. If you don't have a carrier for it then you'll never hear anything. Even if you did, just tell them to pound sand!

(Yeah CMS, I said it....what you gonna do about it?) Crickets....

All true but CMS can now have the DOI come down on agents for marketing violations even if they are not contracted with MA or PDP.

Best practice for med supp only agents is to tell prospects up front when setting appointment that there will not be any discussions of PDP or MA on med supp appointments.

 

[kev_60]

If you were accused of a marketing violation by CMS or state DOI what do you suppose would be the punishment...assuming they found you to be guilty? Just curious as to the severity of the crime of helping your clients....thanks.

 

[SirLurkAlot]

If you were accused of a marketing violation by CMS or state DOI what do you suppose would be the punishment...assuming they found you to be guilty? Just curious as to the severity of the crime of helping your clients....thanks.

You are forced to go captive with Cigna Healthspring!

 

[Todd King]

All true but CMS can now have the DOI come down on agents for marketing violations even if they are not contracted with MA or PDP.

Best practice for med supp only agents is to tell prospects up front when setting appointment that there will not be any discussions of PDP or MA on med supp appointments.

I doubt that very seriously since your DOI doesn't educate you on all the rules for marketing MA's and PDP's. It's the companies who are in charge of making sure you're certified and educated on it. If you never certify then you are not liable to know all of their rules anymore than some P&C agent would.

 

[yorkriver1]

I can report that the Insurance Commissioner in our state came down hard on some agents that appeared to be interfering in the Medicaid full Medicaid/MAPD demonstration project that took clients from agents. Agents are forbidden to discuss the program or to discourage clients from joining.

The fact that they were threatening serious action to those agents got everyone's attention.

 

[agent2.0]

I can report that the Insurance Commissioner in our state came down hard on some agents that appeared to be interfering in the Medicaid full Medicaid/MAPD demonstration project that took clients from agents. Agents are forbidden to discuss the program or to discourage clients from joining.

The fact that they were threatening serious action to those agents got everyone's attention.

I was subject to a complaint by the maryland doi about medicare partd. The complaint came from an agent who lost a few med supp clients. I sold them a med supp and advised on part d. After that I helped enroll them through med.gov .
Through the complaint i maintained that i was helping an elderly client to obtain new coverage that i was not licensed to sell BUT i helped them to save a considerable amount of money since their new plan covered all her drugs versus the captive agent who was squeezing a square peg into a round hole and he was just upset about loosing some money. I was interviewed twice and was found not to be in violation.

 

[yorkriver1]

I was subject to a complaint by the maryland doi about medicare partd. The complaint came from an agent who lost a few med supp clients. I sold them a med supp and advised on part d. After that I helped enroll them through med.gov .
Through the complaint i maintained that i was helping an elderly client to obtain new coverage that i was not licensed to sell BUT i helped them to save a considerable amount of money since their new plan covered all her drugs versus the captive agent who was squeezing a square peg into a round hole and he was just upset about loosing some money. I was interviewed twice and was found not to be in violation.

Still may be looking over my shoulder on these, but looks like they were reasonable. You were doing what was of more benefit to the client, not just trying to get/keep commission.