Health Insurers File for Rate Hikes in Kansas

The Kansas Insurance Department is reviewing requested rate filings for individual and small group health plans in Kansas for 2017.

The range of requested average rate revisions by insurance companies is from 3.3 percent to 49.4 percent, as proposed by the companies in filings in May. The proposed changes are for health plans sold on the federal marketplace and also for plans not sold through the government website. They apply to approximately 6 percent of the Kansas population.

For 2017, a total of 33 plans have been proposed for sale during open enrollment in Kansas on the federally-facilitated online marketplace. That number includes 29 individual and 4 small group plans.

Medica, a non-profit, Minnesota-based company, and Coventry Health and Life are companies with proposed new filings for 2017. Continuing on the marketplace for 2017 are plans filed by BlueCross BlueShield Kansas Solutions (in 103 counties) and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City (offered only in Johnson and Wyandotte counties).

All rate filings are subject to analysis by the insurance department’s Health and Life Division. The insurance companies’ actuarial data and assumptions are reviewed, and all rates are required to be final by Aug. 23, 2016. The requested revisions may not necessarily be the rates filed by the department following the review process.

They will be posted via a link on the Kansas Insurance Department website, www.ksinsurance.org, in the near future.

Open enrollment begins Nov. 1, 2016, for the 2017 calendar year.

The Kansas Insurance Department