Tennessee’s biggest health insurer is preparing to ask for additional rate increases next year comparable to the 36.3 percent jump in premiums charged this year on its ObamaCare health exchange plans.
BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee estimates it will end up losing more than $150 million on its health exchange plans offered in 2015, company CEO J.D. Hickey said Thursday.
“We are not out of the woods yet and as we look out on 2016, we believe that no Tennessee insurance carriers will make any money on this market and, in fact, we’re all going to lose a substantial amount of money,” Hickey told the Chattanooga Rotary Club. “As a result, we’ve already told the Department of Commerce and Insurance in Nashville that we are going to need at least one more rate increase on the order of magnitude of what it was last year.”
BlueCross must submit its preliminary rate requests to state regulators for 2017 premiums by May. Any rate increase must to approved by the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance after reviewing claims and financial data submitted by health insurers across the state.
But Tennessee’s insurance commissioner, Julie Mix McPeak, told a Tennessee Senate Committee hearing last week that consumers should expect another year of double-digit rate hikes.