White House to announce 2nd renewal for old health plans

Americans who kept health plans that didn't comply with the health law's coverage requirements will be able to renew those policies again, sources tell media outlets. The Obama administration is expected to announce the extension today.

The Washington Post: Americans May Be Able To Keep Old Insurance Plans Longer Under Rewrite Of Health-Care Rules
The Obama administration is preparing to announce that Americans who want to keep their old health plans may do so for at least one year longer than they expected, even if the policies don't comply with law, according to insurance industry officials familiar with the latest rewrite of federal health-care rules (Goldstein, 3/4).

The Wall Street Journal: Extension Expected On Health Policies Not Meeting Law
The Obama administration plans to let insurers sell policies that don't comply with the federal health law for at least 12 more months-;a second delay aimed at averting another furor over canceled plans, insurance-industry officials said. Millions of Americans received notices last fall saying their health-insurance policies would be canceled because they didn't meet the Affordable Care Act's stricter coverage standards. In November, President Barack Obama said state insurance commissioners could let health plans reinstate such policies for 12 months since many consumers were unable to use the balky HealthCare.gov website to obtain replacement coverage (Radnofsky and Mathews, 3/4).

Reuters: White House Readies Health Insurance Renewal Extension - Sources
The Obama administration will allow consumers to extend health insurance plans that fail to comply with President Barack Obama's health care law beyond 2014, according to three people familiar with the matter. In a move that could help Democrats avoid a repeat of last autumn's public outcry over canceled health policies, administration officials are expected to announce the change within the next few days, according to the sources (Morgan, 3/4).

Bloomberg: Obama Said To Allow Two-Year Renewal For Old Health Plans
Americans who kept their health plans that didn't comply with Obamacare requirements will be able to renew those policies for two more years, according to a person familiar with the matter. The Obama administration, which has been deliberating the issue since November, is expected to announce today the extension of the health plans, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the decision wasn't yet public (Wayne, 3/5).

CBS News: Obamacare's "Keep Your Plan" Fix To Be Extended
President Obama took some serious heat last year when insurers started dropping millions of Americans from health plans that were no longer Obamacare-compliant, seemingly breaking his promise, "If you have insurance that you like, then you will be able to keep that insurance." Consequently, he enacted an administrative policy change allowing insurers to extend existing plans on the individual and small-group markets for a year. Now, the administration will extend that policy again, CBS News confirms. The administration has said officially that it does not at this time have any policy changes to announce (Condon, 3/4).

Marketplace: Another Delay For The Affordable Care Act?
Remember last fall, when health insurers sent out cancellation letters because some policies didn't meet the Affordable Care Acts requirements? President Obama decided to let people keep those policies a while longer -- in some cases, for a year. Which means they'd be getting cancellation letters again this fall, right before the congressional elections. So the Obama administration could announce as soon as this week that it's rolling back the deadline for people to get off these barebones plans. How many people would be affected? "Probably we're talking about thousands. Certainly not hundreds of thousands," says former insurance executive Wendell Potter (Marshall-Genzer, 3/5).