He Bought Health Insurance for Emergencies. Then He Fell Into a $33,601 Trap. ProPublica 2 hrs ago
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In the spring of 2019, Cory Dowd suddenly found himself without health insurance for the first time. A self-employed event planner, he had just finished a Peace Corps stint that provided health benefits, but he was still more than a year away from starting a graduate program that would provide coverage through his university.
So, like countless others in an online world, he went insurance shopping on the internet.
He Bought Insurance in Case of Emergency. Then Came a Bill for Over $30,000.
Trump-era deregulation of health insurance has led to an explosion of short-term plans carrying high risk for patients.
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In the spring of 2019, Cory Dowd suddenly found himself without health insurance for the first time. A self-employed event planner, he had just finished a Peace Corps stint that provided health benefits, but he was still more than a year away from starting a graduate program that would provide coverage through his university.
Rate increases granted ranged from 12 percent to 31 percent.
“The Florida insurance market is one of the most complex in the world, and the property market is currently facing significant challenges as the frequency of claims increases and those claims become more expensive,” Bakofsky said.
He said the challenges are mostly because of increased litigation, exacerbated by higher catastrophe claim losses as a result of multiple hurricanes over the past several years, and rising reinsurance costs as a result of a hardening reinsurance market.
“These developments have presented challenges not only to the property industry, but also to Florida consumers,” he said.
Updated: May 8, 2021, 6:56am Editorial Note: Forbes Advisor may earn a commission on sales made from partner links on this page, but that doesn t affect our editors opinions or evaluations. Getty
Auto insurance company Metromile soon will let policyholders pay premiums with cryptocurrency and even receive claim payouts in this red-hot form of digital currency.
San Francisco-based Metromile, which offers pay-per-mile insurance, says that it will roll out cryptocurrency capabilities later this year. Metromile spokesperson Rick Chen says a launch date hasn’t been set for the cryptocurrency program.
Metromile says it will be the first insurer to both accept premiums and pay claims in cryptocurrency. Policyholders will be able to pick either cryptocurrency or old-fashioned dollars for premium and claim transactions.
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Root, Inc. first-quarter 2021 earnings call. [Operator instructions] I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Joe Laroche, director of investor relations. Thank you.
You may begin.
Director of Investor Relations
Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. Root is hosting this call to discuss its first-quarter 2021 earnings results. Participating on today s call are Alex Timm, co-founder and CEO; and Dan Rosenthal, chief financial officer. Last evening, Root issued a shareholder letter announcing its financial results.
While this call will reflect items discussed within that document, for a more complete information about our financial performance, we also encourage you to read our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2020, and our quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2021, to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commiss