Insurance Journal Forums

Just seeing how it's been going for the L&H agents out there for this season's open enrollment? I had a few problems with HC.gov yesterday but wound up using a web based entry, Health Sherpa, and it cut my enrollment from about an hour with HC.gov (with creating usernames and passwords, etc) to about 7-8 minutes, with no usernames or passwords. It's almost embarrassing how much healthcare.gov costs the taxpayers and these 20 something year olds from Yale created this site that makes it so easy my 3 year old could do it on her LeapPad.

Anyone else out there having success?

Define success on the most loathed piece of legislation shoved on "stupid" consumers...?

I'm not making a political statement here. The legislation is here and if it's going to benefit me and my company, I'm going to take advantage of it.

I wrote about 35 policies last year which adds up to a pretty nice annual income boost that wasn't there before, and I've already starting writing new policies this year. I'm mainly a P&C client so all of this is an added bonus, not to mention its getting new people in my doors that I can then solicit their P&C business.

Tell me more about health Sherpa. Are you on the $25 per app plan? Is it worth it? What does it do for you?

Yes, so far is absolutely worth it and yes I'm on the $25 per app plan. Last year during open enrollment, there were several times that I thought to myself, "This isn't worth it." Dealing with healthcare.gov and BCBS. Hour long wait times, dealing with helping the consumer create a log in and password (or even an email address for those that don't have computers). A perfectly smooth enrollment last year would take no less than an hour from start to finish. Any hiccups, and it could be an hour and a half.

Now, I literally can get them in and out within 10-15 minutes depending on how much explaining I have to do about the plans/doctors/networks etc.

I don't have to create them an account on HC.gov or BCBSTX.com. Type in a few pieces of info and enroll. They send the app off to HC.gov and in about 10-15 minutes you get the eligiblity letter back showing their subsidy and they send it off to the insurer. They email your customer (and CC you on to it) a copy of their eligibility letter and then in a few days another confirmation email letting them know to pay their first month's premium and to anticipate to hear from their insurer soon.

Of course it hasn't been going long enough to make sure there aren't any problems, and I'm sure I'll run into some. But so far it's a no brainer. I'm more than willing to give up a little commission to save the aggravation.

*I should mention that there is no cost to sign up or monthly minimums. You can sign up and not enroll one single person and it won't hurt you. Here is a video showing the enrollment process https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoH4oIrLQS4

To sign up, kindly use my referral link https://www.healthsherpa.com/agents/new ... nt_id=1116

Sounds like it's worth a try. My problem is that I'm contracted with 7 different carriers and most of them are as a sub-producer through an MGA (I have my own code for 5 of them). I'm just concerned that the carriers won't properly assign an application to me.

I already signed up so I can't use your link. If it works out for me, I'll send you $5

Haha no problem.

I'd ask them but as far as I know it should still work. You have to put in your NPN number, FFM user ID and password. So they link back to your NPN number and you get paid your commissions how you always get paid.

Thank you guys. I now have a life and health license. I will start calling potential customers next week and I will post how it's going after I get a started. Good luck and may the commissions be with you!!

Good luck getting paid your commissions. Sounds like that is not happening for many producers. More turkey, less gravy.

Do you know why? Are they just delayed? Thanks.

Me personally, I haven't missed a single commission payment on any policies. I have heard of some others have a few problems though.

Follow up:
For the 2016 enrollment, I signed up to sell health insurance with an agency. I sold a couple of policies but the agency has not paid my commission. The policy was active 5 months ago on March 1st.
My agency is out-of-state, in Florida. All I've gotten is the email run-around.
Is it unusual to wait 5 months for a commission payment?

Thanks in advance for your input.

Everything to do with health insurance carriers and ACA seems like it takes several months. It's all a Cluster.

It can take the carrier 60-90 days to issue the policy which means 90-120 days to pay commission. And then the agency might not reconcile for another 30 days. Have you asked the agency if they have been paid?