BILL ANALYSIS Ó SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair 2015 - 2016 Regular Session SB 514 (Anderson) - California Health Benefit Exchange ----------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Version: January 15, 2016 |Policy Vote: HEALTH 6-0 | | | | |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Urgency: Yes |Mandate: No | | | | |--------------------------------+--------------------------------| | | | |Hearing Date: January 21, 2016 |Consultant: Brendan McCarthy | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- *********** ANALYSIS ADDENDUM - SUSPENSE FILE *********** The following information is revised to reflect amendments adopted by the committee on January 21, 2016 Bill Summary: SB 514 would prohibit the California Health Benefit Exchange (Covered California) from sharing personal information from an applicant for health care coverage with a certified insurance agent or certified enrollment counsellor without the consent of the applicant. Fiscal Impact: Potential one-time costs of about $300,000 to modify information technology systems by Covered California to allow applicants to indicate whether they would like assistance (special fund). The bill, as amended, does not require Covered California to develop a process for allowing an applicant to indicate whether personal information can be shared. If Covered California does develop such a system, it would incur the costs above. SB 514 (Anderson) Page 1 of ? Unknown potential costs to develop the systems and procedures to pass along consumer information (upon consumer request) to certified insurance agents or enrollment counsellors (special fund). In addition to the system changes needed to allow a consumer to consent to having contact information shared with insurance agents or enrollment counsellors, Covered California will need to develop systems and procedures for taking the appropriate information and sharing it with the appropriate partners. Covered California does not yet have a plan for how that process would work, so no cost estimates are available at this time. It is likely that the costs to create those "back end" systems would be in the low hundreds of thousands. As noted above, those costs would only occur if Covered California decided to implement a system to allow the sharing of applicant information, with consumer consent. Potential minor costs to revise paper applications for health care coverage by the Department of Health Care Services (General Fund and federal funds). The state uses a single paper application for the Medi-Cal program and coverage through Covered California. In order to comply with the requirements of this bill, the Department would likely need to update the paper application to opt out of future contacts. The costs to do so are not expected to be significant since the Department regularly revises those forms. Committee Amendments: Eliminate the requirement that Covered California allow an applicant to indicate whether or not the applicant would like his or her personal information shared with a certified insurance agent or enrollment counsellor. (The bill would continue to prohibit such information sharing without the consent of an applicant.) -- END --