Idaho Confirms: 88% of 2015 QHP enrollees are PAID UP

The HHS Dept. reported that exactly 97,079 people had selected private policies in Idaho via their all-new state-based exchange during 2015 Open Enrollment (including the "standing in line" period).

Unlike most states, Idaho chose not to participate in any sort of special tax filing season enrollment period (MA & CO are the other two which didn't do so; every other state is still allowing enrollment for people who had to pay the fine last year and didn't make the cut this year until April 30th, except for WA which cuts things off today and VT which bumped theirs out until the end of May).

While Idaho, like every state, does still allow people to enroll during the off-season if they have a major life change (getting married/divorced, having a baby, moving, losing other coverage, etc), that tends to be cancelled out by other people dropping their coverage for similar reasons.

As a result, the following press release from Your Health Idaho is about as accurate a measure of the current QHP payment rate in Idaho as you're likely to get without cracking open their actual plan selection records:

BOISE, Idaho – Idahoans’ interest in obtaining health insurance coverage peaked during the state’s second open enrollment period that ended on February 15. Your Health Idaho, Idaho’s health insurance exchange, has more than 85,000 customers currently enrolled in health insurance plans.

...As of the first week of April, 85,128 Idahoans are enrolled in and paying for health insurance plans purchased through Your Health Idaho.

That's 85,128 paying and effectuated enrollees out of just over 97,000 total selections. That 97K figure is probably slightly higher by now (my best guess for ID is that they've averaged perhaps 50 more people selecting plans per day since 2/22, or perhaps 2,200 to date), but again, that's probably been cancelled out by a couple thousand who dropped coverage after being enrolled only for January, February and/or March. That's normal churn. Besides, anyone who enrolled after 3/15 won't have their policy start until May 1st anyway, and thus their first payment isn't due for a couple of weeks yet.

In other words, 85,128 / 97,097 = an 87.7% payment rate for Idaho.

Round that up and you have the exact same 88% ballpark rate I've been estimating since last summer.