WASHINGTON — The Obama administration unveiled a new version of Wednesday, with some improvements as well as at least one early mistake and a new challenge.
Officials also said that won’t display premiums for 2015 until the second week of November. Open-enrollment season runs Nov. 15 through Feb. 15. Coverage can start as early as Jan. 1.
On the plus side, the Affordable Care Act website will feature a streamlined application for most of those signing up for the first time. Seventy-six screens in the health insurance online application have been reduced to 16, officials said. The site has been also optimized for mobile devices.
The goof is a mistranslation in large type on the home page of the Spanish-language version of the site. It’s the very first word on the page. Trying to translate “Get ready,” someone came up with the wrong word in Spanish: “preparase” instead of “preparese.”
The same mistake appears three times on the Spanish home page, which is supposed to be a mirror-image of .
The Spanish-language site had lots of problems last year, ranging from technology issues to clunky translations. The administration struggled to sign up Latinos, the nation’s largest minority and more likely to be uninsured than other ethnic groups.
is the online portal to subsidized private health insurance for consumers who don’t have access to a job-based plan. It served 36 states last open-enrollment season, while the remaining states, including Colorado, ran their own insurance exchanges. The feds as well as some states experienced technical problems. Officials are vowing things will be different this time.
“Where we are focusing in on is a successful consumer experience,” said Andy Slavitt, a tech industry executive brought in by the Health and Human Services department to oversee the relaunch.
Insurers say one big challenge for next year will involve millions of returning customers. It’s not really a technology issue, but a time crunch.
Returning customers will have just one month — until Dec. 15 — to go into their existing accounts and update their financial information. Acting by that date will ensure that they are getting the right amount of financial assistance with their premiums at the start of the new plan year.
