So if an insurance company won't pay we will have to sue them in Federal Court? Gee, that's easy to

[John Q. Citizen]

do.

Or will the FBI be enforcing the new law?

What's the recourse if an insurance company keeps losing the application of a person with a pre-existing condition?


5 years later the court will order the insurance company tosell a policy?


How does this new expansion of corporate powers via the Democrats work? How would someone get the insurance company to follow the law?

[arcadian]

1. Laws? I thought Bush destroyed all of those.

[phleshdef]

2. Yea, telling a company they have to cover people they otherwise wouldnt is an expansion of power.

Your barrage of questioning shows a serious lack of common sense.

[John Q. Citizen]

4. Ever try to get a mortgage company to follow the law? Federal Court is how it's done

Usually a class action suit.

I see your dearth of answers highlights your knowledge of what is being voted on.

[phleshdef]

5. My lack of answers is due to the stupidity of the questions.

People handle problems like that with car insurance and homeowners insurance all the time. You act like this is some special new issue that people don't have to deal with all the time.

[Dr Fate]

6. You make it sound like the status quo.

"People handle problems like that with car insurance and homeowners insurance all the time. You act like this is some special new issue that people don't have to deal with all the time."

When you put it that way, you make it sound like business as usual.

When you mention Home owner's insurance, I recall hurricane Katrina, and how "helpful" the home owner's insurance industry was to the residents there.

Yup-people have to deal with private insurance industry corruption and denial of legit claims all the time- that is the OP's point- we will still be forced to deal with these issues.

[mkultra]

8. why would it matter if it was a federal court or a state court?

Why does that matter one bit. What do you think the circuit courts are for?

[Dr Fate]

9. Why should legit claims even go to court at all? PAY THE GOD DAMN CLAIM.

n/t

[John Q. Citizen]

11. Federal Court is far more expensive. It takes far longer to get a docket date.

My question is why will the insurance companies do the right thing?

If you go and investigate mortgage companies, you will find that there are lots of cases where they just quit paying peoples insurance, their taxes, and people have faced tax sales from counties because of malfeasance from their mortgage companies.

I'm just wondering what mechanism there is in the bill so people don't have to court for years to get medical care if a corporation acts like we know that corporations often act?

Anybody know?

People keep claiming that this bill will stop companies from discriminating against pre-existing conditions. How does it do that? Are the penalties greater than the economic reward for doing so? How is it handled, what if you have a problem how it it settled. Will it be settled before you are dead?


I'm just wondering how the bill handles the problems that are sure to arise, since the only reason insurance companies exist is to make as much money as possible for their stock holders?

[mkultra]

13. really i dont know

I would think that the law would make it a regulation issue. In that we could now bring in in the FCC or some such organization and threaten to shut them down. I believe that's what happens when companies start to break other federal laws.

[John Q. Citizen]

14. I don't think so. The FCC is the federal communications commision. No, I think this

will be like when Citi bank rips off their customers, then somebody some where files a class action suit and years later some BS resolution is arrived at and in the interim the corporations make big bucks.

It will be like when Bernie Madoff rips his people off. Or Enron. Eventually long down the road something may be done but in the meantime the corporate criminals just kind of do whatever they want.

I'm pretty sure that's why the insurance industry and the drug companies have all sighed on to this legislation.


They want it. And they know they will be pretty free to do whatever they want.

[mkultra]

16. yeah, i guess i meant the FTC

Federal Trade Commission.

[Bluenorthwest]

7. It is if you are also telling the customer they have to buy it

and letting the company set the price. Your personal attack on the OP in lieu of facts or answers shows that you have nothing to offer but a display of your own outstanding social and political skills. A barrage of questions calls for a barrage of answers. Or an admission that you do not have them. Personal attacks are not a substitute for truth and honesty.

[Dr Fate]

10. +1 n/t

n/t

[xchrom]

3. we've gone through the looking glass with this thing. nt

[andym]

12. the best punishment for insurers' noncompliance is really the simplest

the federal regulator should have the power to disallow the insurance company from selling insurance.
This would make the most sense and help ensure "good" behavior.


So, is it in the bill. I think so. I'm not a legal expert, but

15 SEC. 242. DUTIES AND AUTHORITY OF COMMISSIONER.
....... (I deleted this part to get to the key parts:)
15 (d) SANCTIONS AUTHORITY.—
16 (1) IN GENERAL.—In the case that the Com
17 missioner determines that a QHBP offering entity
18 violates a requirement of this title, the Commis
19 sioner may, in coordination with State insurance
20 regulators and the Secretary of Labor, provide, in
21 addition to any other remedies authorized by law,
22 for any of the remedies described in paragraph (2).
23 (2) REMEDIES.—The remedies described in this
24 paragraph, with respect to a qualified health benefits
25 plan offered by a QHBP offering entity, are—

1 (A) civil money penalties of not more than
2 the amount that would be applicable under
3 similar circumstances for similar violations
4 under section 1857(g) of the Social Security
5 Act;
6 (B) suspension of enrollment of individuals
7 under such plan after the date the Commis
8 sioner notifies the entity of a determination
9 under paragraph (1) and until the Commis
10 sioner is satisfied that the basis for such deter
11 mination has been corrected and is not likely to
12 recur;

For plans in the exchange even more punishments;

13 (C) in the case of an Exchange-partici
14 pating health benefits plan, suspension of pay
15 ment to the entity under the Health Insurance
16 Exchange for individuals enrolled in such plan
17 after the date the Commissioner notifies the en
18 tity of a determination under paragraph (1)
19 and until the Secretary is satisfied that the
20 basis for such determination has been corrected
21 and is not likely to recur; or
22 (D) working with State insurance regu
23 lators to terminate plans for repeated failure by
24 the offering entity to meet the requirements of
25 this title.

[lumberjack_jeff]

15. Thanks for this. The op likes to lecture people about the bill...

... while remaining comfortably ignorant about its text.

[John Q. Citizen]

17. Is that just for the subsidized portion? Because that references Medicare plus

law under the Social Security Act.

How much funding do the Secretary and the Commissioner have for enforcement?

[ipaint]

20. You mean like the EPA

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?...


or the FCC

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?...


or the Dept. of Agriculture

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?...


or the Dept of Health & Human Services

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/search_result.php?...


etc., etc.



Insurance companies make tons of money denying care, that won't change and placing company shills in key positions is one of the ways to control the system.
As long as the system to enforce the laws in place is corrupt to the core the law is meaningless.

[Cleita]

18. Well maybe now we will have to try to get single payer universal law care so

everyone can get the legal representation they need to take their health insurance company to court.

[John Q. Citizen]

19. Yes, but not until we pass a law that requires everyone pay an attorney. It can only be done

incrementaly because the big law corporations tell us it can only be done incrementally.