ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A broker established last year with plans of helping tens of thousands of Alaska...

1. Broker helping with Alaska insurance signups scales back
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A broker established last year with plans of helping tens of thousands of
Alaskans sign up for private health insurance has scaled back.
Enroll Alaska had set a target of signing up 40,000 people during the open enrollment period that
ran from Oct. 1 through March. They wound up signing up 2,400.
"We just didn't know how hungry people were to get health insurance that was subsidized for the
first time," said Joshua Weinstein, a consultant with Northrim Benefits Group who helped launch
Enroll Alaska.
He blamed the disappointing total in part to the rocky rollout of the federally run online insurance
marketplace. But he also told APRN (http://bit.ly/1kwKMcs) there remains opposition to the federal
health care law and confusion about how the subsidies many Alaskans qualify would work. He said
insurance companies weren't processing applications smoothly, either.
Enroll Alaska had 30 agents working for it last October. It now has six. The broker did not renew the
contract of chief operating officer Tyann Boling, he said.
"We did not achieve our enrollment expectations so accordingly, we've adjusted our staffing to
support the business that we did capture," he said.
While Enroll Alaska is smaller in size, Weinstein said he's "very comfortable" with the position the
broker is now in and expects to hire new agents for the next open enrollment period that begins in
November.
He said the fact that penalties for people without coverage will grow might encourage people to look
again at enrollment. The company thinks it can double the number of enrollees in Alaska for next
year, he said.
Since the last open enrollment period closed, Enroll Alaska each month has signed up about 50 to 75
people who were eligible for enrollment due to qualifying life events, like moving or changing jobs.
That is more than the broker expected.
In all, about 13,000 Alaskans signed up for insurance through the federal marketplace during the
last open enrollment period. Weinstein said the federal government estimates that more than
100,000 Alaskans would qualify for subsidies to help pay for insurance.
© 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast,
rewritten or redistributed.