CMS delays risk corridor credits for health exchange insurers over bad data
The risk corridor program gives credits to insurers who take on previously uninsured members.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said it will delay releasing data on its risk corridor ratios for insurers participating in health insurance exchanges after it found several discrepancies in the data.
The risk corridor program gives credits to insurers who take on previously uninsured members.
[Also: CMS failing to verify income, citizenship for Healthcare.gov credits, OIG report says]
Participating insurers had until July 31 to submit the data to CMS, and the agency had planned to release estimates of payments or charges to insurers by August 14.
"We will provide further information when the risk corridors data is accurate, complete, and validated," the agency said in an announcement. "If CMS determines that an issuer must resubmit its risk corridors data, CMS will work with the issuer to do so."
Risk corridors were designed in the Affordable Care Act to help mitigate the risk of setting prices for exchange plans. If the premiums proved too low and insurers lost money, the government pays a certain amount back. On the other hand, insurers could also have to pay the government back if the savings were too high.
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