The Healthcare.gov online marketplace was used by 534,778 consumers to select insurance plans during the second week of open enrollment, according to the “weekly snapshot report” issued by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Total selections for the first two weeks were 1,077,786, HHS reported. For both weeks, about one-third of those selecting health insurance plans on the federal marketplace were new insureds, while two-thirds were renewing their coverage.
More than 2.61 million users visited the website in the second week of enrollment, compared to 3.18 million the prior week. Of these, just under 900,000 submitted applications for coverage, compared to 1.15 million in the first week of enrollment. The Spanish-language CuidadoDeSalud.gov site had nearly 53,000 visitors, compared to over 66,000 the prior.
About 768,000 used the “window shopping” feature on Healthcare.gov, along with 11,742 on CuidadoDeSalud.gov. The comparable figures for the prior week were 1.15 million for Healthcare.gov and 58,876 for CuidadoDeSalud.gov.
Phone calls to the HHS call center totaled nearly 766,000, with an average wait time of 2 minutes and 57 seconds, for English-speaking consumers. This compares to more than 741,000 calls, with a wait time of 4 minutes and 38 seconds, the prior week. Calls to Spanish-speaking representatives totaled 50,195, down from the prior week’s 52,023, with average wait times for both weeks of just 11 seconds.
HHS noted that the Thanksgiving holiday fell during the second week of last year’s Open Enrollment period, making comparisons with 2015 figures difficult.
