covered-california

For those who missed Monday’s hard deadline to sign up for healthcare, the State of California announced another grace period before tax penalties will be accrued. 

Citing long lines at enrollment centers and troubles with the State’s overloaded Covered California exchange website, officials said anyone who tried to enroll by Monday now has until April 15 to become enrolled. Prior to Monday, Federal officials announced a similar window for people to catch up, providing they had created an online account and make a good-faith effort to enroll before March 31. 

Now, however, no proof of account will be required to take advantage of the extension, so even those who have not yet created an account have two more weeks to sign up for health insurance. 

A mid-March Kaiser Health Tracking Poll showed that at least 60% of those still uninsured were unaware of the March 31 deadline and half of those who lacked coverage at the time of the poll planned to remain uninsured. Officials estimate that in L.A. County, around a million people remain uninsured, with an estimated third to one-half of of those lacking documentation of legal residency, making them ineligible for federally subsidized programs. 

Those who do not sign up for healthcare before the deadline will be subject to a penalty on their 2014 tax return. These “individual shared responsibility payments” start at $95 per adult for low-income households and can go into the thousands of dollars for high-income families who will owe 1% of their net income up to the average national cost of bronze health coverage for all family members (the Urban Institute’s Health Policy Center estimates that at about $3,600 per adult and $1,900 per child in 2014). A calculator from the Tax Policy Center shows how big the fines can be. 

The public healthcare marketplaces will close on April 15 and will not reopen until November 15 for enrollment in 2015 coverage.  

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