Insurance Cancellation

NancyNJ

Has anyone had a problem with Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of NJ cancelling or threatening to cancel insurance? We are a small group just my husband and I - they claim there has to be two full time employees to keep the policy and question how I can still work full time.  Supposedly we mysteriously got pulled in a random audit....first time ever in 25 years of business....after submitting what I would guess is 1.3 million in bills in the last 2 1/2 years. if anyone knows an advocasy group or anyone I could get some support from?

SpecialK

Here is the link to New Jersey's Insurance Commissioner, and also a link to Loyola University Cancer Legal Resource Center.  Good luck!

http://www.state.nj.us/dobi/index.html

http://www.disabilityrightslegalcenter.org/about/cancerlegalresource.cfm

peggy_j

Sorry you're going through this. Hopefully one of the state orgs can help. FWIW, the state of CA actually sued some of those big insurance companies a few years back (and won) for wrongly canceling policies. Hopefully your state can help. Best of luck!

glostagirl

Hi Nancy, 

My husband and I, self-employed, have a similar situation with a BCBS PPO in Mass. We got a call from our insurance agent this past fall, he informed us that BCBS would no longer accept small groups such as ours and he advised us to switch.  For a variety of reason we've decided to stay with BCBS and have not yet had any problems, although at renewal our rate went up almost $300 per month.

We did have to jump thru quite a few hoops of proving my full time employement status, to get this insurance in the first place, our agent and our accountant were quite helpful with this.  Good to know there could be a future "random" audit.  

You may have only to provide proof that you are working "full-time"; which is not always defined by 40 hours.  In MA, I think it's only 20 hours.  Assumming you haven't applied for disability or unemployment, what are their grounds to question your ability to work?  It sounds discriminatory, many people work thru cancer treatment.  

Hope this helps, good luck. 

besa

http://www.patientadvocate.org/index.php

Possibly the "patient advocate foundation" may be able to help.  Their services are supposed to be free.