I wish people wouldn't be so rude to those who lose out under the ACA.

[cynzke]

136. Everyone is 100% better......

by eliminating the insurance companies' favorite escape hatch...."pre-existing condition". Up until ACA, you had NO guarantee of coverage despite what that piece of paper you have called your policy states. Actual coverage is decided by the insurance company on a claim by claim basis. They go over everything detail of your claim looking for ways to deny or whittle down payouts and they usually use pre-existing conditions. Well, you say...my policy says/defines pre-existing condition as one that was diagnosed and treated prior to the policy. Insurance companies don't care what their policies say. They violate their policies all the time. Here is an example from Bluecrosssucks.com.

"We signed our infant son up with Blue Cross for his health insurance. When he was about six months old we took him to a specialist to look at his eye. Upon receiving the bill, they retroactively canceled his coverage for all the well-baby checkups gone to up to that point: they actually received a refund from his health care provider. Their excuse was a technicality, that we had failed to disclose a pre-existing condition which had nothing to do with his eye; and my wife was able, after months of wrangling, to prove to them that she had in fact disclosed all the relevant information. They reinstated our coverage at a higher premium, but never reimbursed the doctor. Furthermore they refused to pay the specialist, saying the issue with his eye was also a pre-existing condition. Skipping the more pressing question of "what good is health insurance that doesn't cover a baby's pre-existing condition" we proceeded directly to the fine print terms of our agreement with them, which specified that a pre-existing condition is anything that had been diagnosed or treated prior to the effective start date of the coverage. His eye had never been examined, diagnosed, or treated until we took him to the specialist. They don't care, we have to pay the specialist out of pocket. In the end, we have been paying them nearly a hundred dollars a month for more than a year, and they have paid out a net of nearly zero dollars, effectively stealing from our doctor and from us. I believe they have committed fraud and I am looking into the option of taking them to court."

Read the stories at the link below and you'll begin to realize you had no guarantees no matter how good your old policy looked on paper. These people found out the hard way. At least the ACA has closed one of the most successful tools insurance companies had at their disposal....pre-existing conditions. The income level for subsidies should be raised. It's too low.

http://www.bluecrosssucks.com/consumer.htm