Just Got this from FFM/CMS Agent/broker Newsletter

[TN_agent]

From my email today:

Retaining Consumer Information for Follow-Up with the Marketplace

If a consumer provides you written authorization to retain his or her name and contact information (including the application ID number) for the purposes of follow-up with the Marketplace and/or resolution of outstanding questions or issues the consumer may have related to the Marketplace, then you are required to store and maintain that Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in a manner that complies with applicable state and Federal laws.

You are not permitted to maintain the PII or contact that consumer for other purposes. You may not use the PII obtained to follow up with consumers for quality assurance surveys or to offer assistance with other programs or other services in the future. If a consumer does not give you consent to follow up with him or her regarding enrollment through the Marketplace, you may not contact the consumer to inquire about or seek confirmation of the consumer's enrollment status.

Would be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

 

[FLM2]

From my email today:

Retaining Consumer Information for Follow-Up with the Marketplace

If a consumer provides you written authorization to retain his or her name and contact information (including the application ID number) for the purposes of follow-up with the Marketplace and/or resolution of outstanding questions or issues the consumer may have related to the Marketplace, then you are required to store and maintain that Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in a manner that complies with applicable state and Federal laws.

You are not permitted to maintain the PII or contact that consumer for other purposes. You may not use the PII obtained to follow up with consumers for quality assurance surveys or to offer assistance with other programs or other services in the future. If a consumer does not give you consent to follow up with him or her regarding enrollment through the Marketplace, you may not contact the consumer to inquire about or seek confirmation of the consumer's enrollment status.

Would be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

Good luck with enforcing this, Marketplace...

 

[Norwayguy]

Good luck with enforcing this, Marketplace...

Sounds like CMS rules for MAs

 

[taterpeeler]

Sounds like CMS rules for MAs

bingo... soa are rising in the east

 

[AllenChicago]

From my email today:

Retaining Consumer Information for Follow-Up with the Marketplace

If a consumer provides you written authorization to retain his or her name and contact information (including the application ID number) for the purposes of follow-up with the Marketplace and/or resolution of outstanding questions or issues the consumer may have related to the Marketplace, then you are required to store and maintain that Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in a manner that complies with applicable state and Federal laws.

Would be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

Thankfully, none of my consumer clients provided me with written authorization, therefore I can ignore this "guidance" from CMS.

Just get the same verbal or implied authorization as you always have, and you're good to go!

 

[G.Gordon]

Talk about contradictory. At the same time they will take a 365 authorization from a client on the phone for their agent and the agent can do anything on the application including enroll and/or cancel coverage.

 

[Tkruger]

From my email today:

You are not permitted to maintain the PII or contact that consumer for other purposes. You may not use the PII obtained to follow up with consumers for quality assurance surveys or to offer assistance with other programs or other services in the future. If a consumer does not give you consent to follow up with him or her regarding enrollment through the Marketplace, you may not contact the consumer to inquire about or seek confirmation of the consumer's enrollment status.

What the....

So let me get this right...we ferret out the clients to enroll them into QHP's via HC.gov and have no rights to the data we encured the costs to aquire....Yeah...sure...that's gonna fly.

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Also, aren't we required by our licensure to retain the data for a minimum number of years?

These folks at CMS are so disconnected from reality and other existing laws in place that while I should be surprised a part deep down inside is...

 

[RayNY]

Good thing our government has taken such well-planned and careful action to protect the PII of American citizens. The recent broker breaches have had widespread and expensive impact on tens of millions of Americans.

Oh, wait, I'm sorry, none of that is true, there hasn't been any major broker breaches, and this half-assed and rushed law conflicts with standing regulations. All it does is place undue burden on brokers. Can get in trouble for contacting my clients and making sure they're happy? For ensuring their enrollment was successful and error free? For offering other products? For keeping the PII I NEED in order to service their account?

The carriers have leaked at least 90 million identities in the past quarter, but the that's none of the lawmaker's concern.

 

[Sherota1]

From my email today:

Retaining Consumer Information for Follow-Up with the Marketplace

If a consumer provides you written authorization to retain his or her name and contact information (including the application ID number) for the purposes of follow-up with the Marketplace and/or resolution of outstanding questions or issues the consumer may have related to the Marketplace, then you are required to store and maintain that Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in a manner that complies with applicable state and Federal laws.

You are not permitted to maintain the PII or contact that consumer for other purposes. You may not use the PII obtained to follow up with consumers for quality assurance surveys or to offer assistance with other programs or other services in the future. If a consumer does not give you consent to follow up with him or her regarding enrollment through the Marketplace, you may not contact the consumer to inquire about or seek confirmation of the consumer's enrollment status.

Would be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on this.

Starting next year if someone wants to work with me they will be required to sign a BOR from day 1. They will have to sign a consent form giving me permission to follow up with them and or the insurance company regarding their enrollment status. If they refuse to do this I will send them to the exchange where they can deal with any issues that come up on their own.
I refuse to become an application taker. I don't know if this is purely a CMS move or if it's an inside job by the insurance companies who do not want to be accountable for screwing up clients accounts. Also if we do not check on the enrollment status especially with companies that do. To feel the need to keep us informed trust me we would have no way of tracking if and how much we should be paid.
I work for myself and my clients not for them. What they do not understand is that many of us had a book of business long before this law started and we had and have retained our clients information from long ago. Some of our clients have more than one type of insurance account with us. Our job is to follow up with them. Circumstances change and results in our clients either needing more less or a different kind of service. Annual reviews is a major part of our roll. And will continue to be mine.
Many people who were signing up for insurance asked me if I sell other types of insurance. I told them yes. I guess now I will let them know that they need to give written consent if they need life or other types of insurance sold by me.
My take on this is they have no authority over PII of clients we had before the law started. The signature would really be related to that Marketplace ID and information related to that specific application. If we use their information that we had prior to them enrolling into an ACA plan we are not out of compliance with this new ridiculous standard.
There are many states that are now seeing the value of working with brokers not because the had a light bulb moment but because they are running out of ACA money and need to find a more cost effective way of enrolling people. Maryland is the only state I'm ACA certified in that really works well with agents and brokers. We even have our own agent broker portal with a list of all of our enrolled clients. At the end of Open Enrollment they emailed us a list of all of our clients including any dependents associated with their accounts. All of my clients in MD transferred 100% successful. They even had a referral program for consumers who wanted to work with an agent. Overall their system which they adopted from Connecticut was great.
Love my clients. FFM get a clue. Yeah right

 

[MaryDallas]

Good luck with enforcing this, Marketplace...

Too late now: my marketplace people and I are 'best friends' .... we've been through so much together. I've been invited to BBQ's, weddings; people stop as they are driving from Houston to Dallas to go out to lunch. I've had referrals of their children, grandchildren, brothers, sisters, dad/mom, cousins, nieces/nephews. Don't know how to stop the love.

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Good thing our government has taken such well-planned and careful action to protect the PII of American citizens. The recent broker breaches have had widespread and expensive impact on tens of millions of Americans.

Oh, wait, I'm sorry, none of that is true, there hasn't been any major broker breaches, and this half-assed and rushed law conflicts with standing regulations. All it does is place undue burden on brokers. Can get in trouble for contacting my clients and making sure they're happy? For ensuring their enrollment was successful and error free? For offering other products? For keeping the PII I NEED in order to service their account?

The carriers have leaked at least 90 million identities in the past quarter, but the that's none of the lawmaker's concern.

And on the conference call with V.P. Biden on Feb. 11th, 2015 he stated: 'This call is to let you know how much the agents/brokers are appreciated. I apologize for the low commissions. It is our hope that your business has increased because of being able to write those people that previously did not have health insurance .... and hopefully, it will open the door to write life insurance and supplemental insurance.'

Okay, so now he owes us an apology for the s .. l .. o .. w pay as well. Nothing has ever been said about no contact with the clients. That is absurd.