Agents get subsidized 'obamacare' using fake ids

[markomalley]

From the AP:

Undercover investigators using fake identities were able to secure taxpayer-subsidized health insurance under President Barack Obama’s health care law.

The weak link in the system seemed to be call centers that handled applications for thousands of consumers unable to get through online.

The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office was to tell a House committee on Wednesday that its investigators were able to get subsidized health care under fake names in 11 out of 18 attempts.

(snip)

The GAO report will provide another line of attack for Republican lawmakers who have relentlessly tried to kill the 2010 Affordable Care Act. It raises questions about new sorts of flaws in the enrollment system for HealthCare.gov, which experienced major technical problems when it went live last fall. Ultimately, 8 million people managed to sign up for subsidized health care in federal and state exchanges that handled “Obamacare” enrollment.

Nobody should have to show ID in order to get Obamacare…it should be freely available to anybody who wants it.

Nor should there be any limitations to what it covers. After all, what is covered should be strictly between the doctor and the patient…we don’t want employers involved, nor do we want insurance companies saying what should be covered…and, well, the government shouldn’t be involved (in the event that some evil Republican ever manages to get elected again).

Nor should there be any premiums. After all, premiums are not fair to the poor.

Nor should there be any deductibles. Deductibles hit those who can least afford it.

Nor should there be co-pays. That might prevent people from getting care because they can’t afford the co-pay.

Nor should anybody’s taxes be raised to finance it…after all, money should not ever, ever, ever be a factor in the delivery of health care.

And the people who work in the industry should do so for free. I mean, who should be allowed to get rich because of health care?

After all, it shouldn’t be about money, should it?

:doh2:

:banghead:

 

[ProdglArchitect]

From the AP:

Undercover investigators using fake identities were able to secure taxpayer-subsidized health insurance under President Barack Obama’s health care law.

The weak link in the system seemed to be call centers that handled applications for thousands of consumers unable to get through online.

The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office was to tell a House committee on Wednesday that its investigators were able to get subsidized health care under fake names in 11 out of 18 attempts.

(snip)

The GAO report will provide another line of attack for Republican lawmakers who have relentlessly tried to kill the 2010 Affordable Care Act. It raises questions about new sorts of flaws in the enrollment system for HealthCare.gov, which experienced major technical problems when it went live last fall. Ultimately, 8 million people managed to sign up for subsidized health care in federal and state exchanges that handled “Obamacare” enrollment.

Nobody should have to show ID in order to get Obamacare…it should be freely available to anybody who wants it.

Nor should there be any limitations to what it covers. After all, what is covered should be strictly between the doctor and the patient…we don’t want employers involved, nor do we want insurance companies saying what should be covered…and, well, the government shouldn’t be involved (in the event that some evil Republican ever manages to get elected again).

Nor should there be any premiums. After all, premiums are not fair to the poor.

Nor should there be any deductibles. Deductibles hit those who can least afford it.

Nor should there be co-pays. That might prevent people from getting care because they can’t afford the co-pay.

Nor should anybody’s taxes be raised to finance it…after all, money should not ever, ever, ever be a factor in the delivery of health care.

And the people who work in the industry should do so for free. I mean, who should be allowed to get rich because of health care?

After all, it shouldn’t be about money, should it?

:doh2:

:banghead:

It took me a minute to realize that you were being sarcastic >_>

Just another bit of evidence to add to pile that Obamacare is a terrible system. I’m curious about the way they did this though, they say they used fake ID, but then say that the weak link was the call center, which wouldn’t necessarily see the fake ID. The article doesn’t go into too much detail about how they were able to do this, which make sense since you don’t really want people doing this.

 

[DarkLight]

This is a common problem in our day and age. My guess is overworked call center reps just passed applications through as quickly as they could rather than checking everything.

Really though I’m not sure why you’d want to do this?

 

[BlueEyedLady]

So if someone wants to risk being charged with fraud, they can sign up with a fake ID. Um…people do that with everything. But we don’t throw out the apartment industry, the alcohol and tobacco industry, higher education, the patent system, the heath care system, pharmacies, etc. You know, virtually everything else.

This isn’t evidence of Obamacare being evil anymore than apartment rentals are evil because you can get one if you lie. It’s evidence that we need to work to prevent fraud and heavily prosecute it when it does happen.

 

[John_Matrix]

So if someone wants to risk being charged with fraud, they can sign up with a fake ID. Um…people do that with everything. But we don’t throw out the apartment industry, the alcohol and tobacco industry, higher education, the patent system, the heath care system, pharmacies, etc. You know, virtually everything else.

This isn’t evidence of Obamacare being evil anymore than apartment rentals are evil because you can get one if you lie. It’s evidence that we need to work to prevent fraud and heavily prosecute it when it does happen.

Agreed in theory, but legally and civically, most of those don’t involve federal money though. I’d say when federal charges are involved, much like falsely claiming to be someone else and filing taxes in their name 9ala a dead person to collect a refund), the government treats this VERY seriously.

And yet, I doubt someone who can’t afford any other health insurance is prepared to pay a $250,000 fine on federal charges, or serve 12 months in prison. Stealing booze and stealing from the federal government are not the same thing.

 

[qui_est_ce]

This is a common problem in our day and age. My guess is overworked call center reps just passed applications through as quickly as they could rather than checking everything.

Really though I’m not sure why you’d want to do this?

They are certainly not overworked. Big scandal in St. Louis:

stltoday.com/news/special-reports/mohealth/workers-at-wentzille-obamacare-center-played-board-games-ex-employee/article_9a84cbdd-f2ee-5961-98cd-7d24dc5b08eb.html

A former employee at an Affordable Care Act processing center in Wentzville recalls having so little work to do that she played board games while some co-workers slept.
Lavonne Takatz, 42, worked at the center in Wentzville from October to April.

“We played Pictionary. We played 20 Questions. We played Trivial Pursuit,” she told the Post-Dispatch Wednesday.

Such allegations have spurred members of Missouri’s congressional delegation to call for investigations of the taxpayer-funded center in Wentzville, one of three nationally that are contracted to process paper applications for the new health-care law.

In the whole month of December, she said, she processed about six applications.

Workers became so bored and hostile, Takatz claims, that Serco began providing books to read. Employees were told they could not speak to the media, even if they left the company.

 

[7_Sorrows]

I don’t know if they were using fake ID’s necessarily but giving social security numbers that were incorrect and reporting false income.

It seems like every government program created is susceptible to fraud. So much government waste.

If someone was able to submit 12 false applications and have 11 be accepted shows how broken this program is.

 

[seekerz]

Anybody can commit fraud and get government money: that goes for those at the top of the income ladder just as it does for those at the bottom. Greed in a universal human temptation. Nothing to do with whether Obamacare is good or bad.

The real test of Obamacare IMO, is all the governors everywhere allowing full implementation of the ACA, including Medicaid expansion, and THEN we’ll see what happens to premiums all round. My guess is that, just like in Kentucky, even those who oppose Obamacare will simply love what the Affordable Care Act does for the health care system and their pocketbooks.

Of course, any phenomenon which threatens to disprove the mantra that government can only act to waste money, never to save it, won’t actually be given a chance by ideologues.