States Rebel Against Obamacare Website Contractor
For Christmas, Vermont and Massachusetts are giving a lump of coal to CGI Federal, the Canadian company that built Healthcare.gov and seven other state-based health care exchanges.
For Christmas, Vermont and Massachusetts are giving a lump of coal to CGI Federal, the Canadian company that built Healthcare.gov and seven other state-based health care exchanges.
The two states have stopped payment to the contractor because, as with the national website, their health care portals left much to be desired. Massachusetts already had a health care exchange in place from when the whole thing was Gov. Mitt Romney’s idea, but the state took out a $69 million contract with CGI Federal to bring it in line with the Affordable Care Act.
Massachusetts has reverted to using an alternative software system and paper notifications for residents seeking new insurance, a significant black eye for a system that was held up as a national model for providing coverage after it debuted in 2007.
In Vermont, state officials recently alerted CGI that the state is withholding payment of $5.1 million as compensation for the company’s failure to meet key deadlines.
The state is also disputing more than $1 million in charges billed by CGI because of incomplete work that left its insurance website so far behind schedule that Vermonters could not buy coverage online, as promised under Obama’s health care law, until early December, two months after it opened.
Not all states have suffered to the same extreme. While the federal website, Healthcare.gov, has become a joke, Covered California, also built by CGI, performed much better.
Still, Vermont and Massachusetts could prove to be trendsetters. As The Verge points out, “CGI also built most of the federal marketplace, Healthcare.gov, which was also plagued by errors and downtime. The administration has not taken any action against the contractor, however, nor have any of the other five states for which CGI built exchanges with varying success.” That could change as the crown jewel of the Obama administration has come under renewed attack. It’s a political hot potato, and, with midterm elections coming up, it might be easier to throw the spud over the border into Canada.
— Posted by Peter Z. Scheer
Your support is crucial…With an uncertain future and a new administration casting doubt on press freedoms, the danger is clear: The truth is at risk.
Now is the time to give. Your tax-deductible support allows us to dig deeper, delivering fearless investigative reporting and analysis that exposes what’s really happening — without compromise.
Stand with our courageous journalists. Donate today to protect a free press, uphold democracy and unearth untold stories.
Health & Wellness
More than 3 million adults would be at immediate risk of losing coverage if Republicans reverse the expansion of federal Medicaid funding.
Health & Wellness
While 40,000 Dreamers are likely to gain coverage, nearly half a million undocumented immigrants still cannot afford health insurance.
Health & Wellness
Eighteen million Americans could soon lose access to Medicaid.
The people of Mumbra fear that the government is threatening their independence and their identity.
Its decision on an appeal of a lower-court ruling declaring part of the statute unconstitutional is unlikely to come before the election.
Despite campaign promises to replace the Affordable Care Act with something better, the uninsured rate has risen on the president's watch.
You need to be a supporter to comment.
There are currently no responses to this article.
Be the first to respond.