WASHINGTON — The White House is bracing for a deluge of complaints when Americans first try to use ObamaCare to pay for medical treatment starting New Year’s Day.
“We are very focused on it,” President Obama’s top health-policy adviser, Phil Schiliro, told reporters Tuesday.
He insisted that there “always are going to be unexpected problems whenever there is a transition.”
A chief concern, according to administration officials, is that people who have signed up for ObamaCare will not receive their insurance cards or their plans will not activate before they visit a doctor or pharmacy.
The anticipated difficulties follow months of problems with HealthCare.gov that prevented people from signing up for the new mandatory health plans.
In an attempt to smooth the transition, pharmacy giants CVS and Walgreens instituted policies of honoring customers’ new health plans even if they haven’t yet taken effect.
“We have to work very hard to make sure the next few days go well,” said Schiliro.
The administration touted a late-December surge that boosted enrollment to 2.1 million.
But they simultaneously warned of likely problems.
Schiliro offered a step-by-step bureaucratic solution to consumer complaints: “What we are stressing to folks is that if they get to a provider, if there is some confusion, call their insurer,” he said.
“If the insurer is not able to resolve it, they should call our toll-free number that we set up and operators will be there 24/7,” he continued. “If the operators have a problem resolving it at the call center, it will go to a special-case worker.” Those case workers will try to resolve problems as quickly as possible.”
About 10,000 trained ObamaCare agents were scheduled to be standing by the phones Wednesday to answer consumer questions, said Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services spokeswoman Julie Bataille.