Still need health coverage for 2015?

Did you owe the tax penalty this year for not having health insurance last year and you didn’t qualify for an exemption? Were you caught unaware of the 2015 Open Enrollment deadline of Feb. 15 and now are worried that you’re going to owe another penalty because you won’t have health insurance in 2015, too?

If you answered yes to those questions, you have until April 30 to take advantage of a Special Enrollment Period (SEP) through the Affordable Care Act, and you might quality for some nice premium tax credits and cost-sharing reductions that would help cover that insurance.

There’s also a brand new SEP being granted after April 28 for those whose incomes now make them eligible for the premium tax credits. As long as you aren’t offered coverage through a job, anyone else’s job, Medicaid, Medicare, or VA benefits, you will most likely be able to find an affordable policy now through healthcare.gov.

In the past, only those who already tried to get enrolled through healthcare.gov could qualify for this, and even then it was tricky. The main catch now is you can only take advantage of this new SEP by calling the healthcare.gov call center at 800-318-2596, after April 28, and only if your income increase occurred within the last 60 days. You also must be able to attest to the fact that you were previously denied Medicaid.

Since Alaska still does not have Medicaid expansion, many whose incomes fall below the federal poverty line for Alaska were denied Medicaid, and many whose incomes were above the poverty line also were denied Medicaid unless they had children and lacked assets. This is known as the “Medicaid gap” and has negatively affected a lot of people across the country in non-expansion states like Alaska.

As always, the amount of tax credits and cost-sharing reductions you would qualify for depend on your family size (tax household) and your estimated adjusted gross income for 2015.

There is a tool on the healthcare.gov website at www.healthcare.gov/see-plans/ where you can put in your ZIP code, your estimated household income, and the ages of those in your household and whether they need coverage, and you will be able to find out how much in premium tax credits you could qualify for each month. Then, you can see how much the health insurance policies would cost after that tax credit was applied.

A word of caution when using the “See Plans & Prices” tool: Be sure to look at the “silver” plans first, because those are the ones that incorporate both the tax credit and the cost-sharing reduction that would lower the deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums. Many people make the mistake of looking at the “bronze” plans first and then freak out because the deductibles are so high and give up.

For questions, or to make an appointment for free help, give me a call at Mat-Su Health Services at 352-3225.

K.T. (Kate) McKee is a certified application counselor for the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) at Mat-Su Health Services, 1363 W. Spruce Ave., in Wasilla.