Nice to have an official number, and like the other state-run exchanges which have overhauled their systems, Minnesota's 2015 kickoff is a massive improvement over last year:
Strong Enrollment
Since the 2015 open enrollment period began on Saturday, 1,516 consumers have enrolled in Qualified Health Plans through the MNsure marketplace. By contrast, 406 consumers enrolled in Qualified Health Plans during the first two weeks of the 2014 open enrollment period, meaning MNsure has enrolled four times more people in its first four days than it did last year in two weeks. Also, 765 have enrolled in MinnesotaCare and 2,431 have enrolled in Medical Assistance. MNsure is the only place for Minnesotans to find out if they are eligible for financial assistance such as tax credits, and low-cost or no-cost coverage.
Again, for comparison, during the first open enrollment period, Minnesota enrolled 48,495 people, or 242 per day, so their initial pace is about even with that so far:
More than 500 people signed up for commercial health insurance this weekend through MNsure, the state’s health insurance exchange.
Open enrollment started Saturday at MNsure, and more than 27,000 new and returning users accessed the health exchange website through the weekend, said Scott Leitz, the MNsure chief executive during a news conference Monday in St. Paul. About 2,700 people phoned the MNsure call center for help, and the average wait time was about two minutes, Leitz said.
The first-weekend figures are a good start toward meeting enrollment goals, Leitz said. The number of phone calls this weekend was 10 times the typical volume for MNsure.
This makes the 5th state-run exchange to report hard numbers for Day One...this brings the verified Day One total to 2,515 QHP enrollees. Again, small but symbolically significant.
MNsure calls Saturday’s open enrollment a big improvement from what happened last year.
As of 3 p.m., 201 people had signed up for health insurance.
On average, customers waited for help a little more than one minute. Last year, the average wait was more than two hours.
OK, the numbers have barely moved, and technically this update is missing 3 days (it only runs through 11/11 instead of 11/14), but MNsure has been the only exchange, federal or state, which has provided an almost odometer-like frequency of off-exchange updates.
Amazing. Even with things ramping up for #OE2 (Open Enrollment Period 2), and even with the midterm elections overwhelming everything for the past few weeks, Minnesota continues to quietly plod along, racking up the ACA enrollments along the way:
Latest Enrollment Numbers
November 4, 2014
Health Coverage Type Cumulative Enrollments
Medical Assistance 233,194
MinnesotaCare 80,111
Qualified Health Plan (QHP) 55,813
TOTAL 369,118
Minnesota's exchange (called MNsure and pronounced to rhyme with "insure") has had it's share of technical problems, but they haven't been nearly as bad as the 4 state-run exchanges undergoing full overhauls (OR & NV are scrapping theirs entirely; MA & MD started over from scratch). They got hit with some bad news recently when the largest insurer on the exchange decided to bail, although that appears to have had more to do with that company's poor business decisions than anything on MNsure's side.
However, they've continued to keep chugging along, quietly adding more enrollees to both private QHP policies (via qualifying life events) as well as Medicaid and MinnesotaCare (neither of which have any deadlines involved). Most relevant to myself, they're also the only exchange which has continued to provide consistent, regular enrollment data updates on a near-daily basis, which is manna from heaven from my POV.
As we head into the final few weeks before the 2nd Open Enrollment period, it looks like MNsure is the only state which is left posting regular off-season enrollment updates. Things are definitely tapering off (only 113 new QHPs over the past 6 days & 3,294 added to Medicaid/MinnesotaCare), but that's still over 3,400 more people with coverage.
latest enrollment numbers
October 22, 2014
Health Coverage Type Cumulative Enrollments
Medical Assistance 227,476
MinnesotaCare 78,321
Qualified Health Plan (QHP) 55,564
TOTAL 361,361
Things may be slowing down, but some people are still enrolling in 2014 QHPs just 1 month before the 2015 enrollment period opens; 162 Minnesotans from 10/8 - 10/16. In addition, Medicaid/MinnesotaCare has jumped by over 7,000 people:
latest enrollment numbers
October 16, 2014
Health Coverage Type Cumulative Enrollments
Medical Assistance 224,891
MinnesotaCare 77,612
Qualified Health Plan (QHP) 55,451
TOTAL 357,954
