Poor credit score means higher insurance rates...?

http://m.clickorlando.com/news/Lead-health-care-navigator-in-Florida-provides-wrong-information-on-credit-scores/-/16721250/22341034/-/ie5en5/-/index.html

By Louis Bolden, Reporter, lbolden@clickorlando.com

Published On: Oct 08 2013 07:09:19 PM EDT 

Anne Packham, one of the people assigned by the state to help people navigate the government's website, asserted in an interview on Tuesday – and then later to follow up questions - that the credit check was put in place so providers can make an educated decision about who to insure.

"That's so that health insurance providers can make an educated decision about who to insure based on if someone is defaulting on all of their bills they may not want to have them as part of their health plan," she said during Tuesday’s on-camera interview.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said Wednesday credit scores have nothing to do with insurance rates under the Affordable Care Act.

“Insurers are not allowed to factor in credit scores when setting premiums and at no point in the process are peoples’ scores accessed,” the HHS spokesperson wrote in an e-mail response to our questions.

Local 6 confronted Packham on Wednesday and asked her, “How does someone in your position get that wrong?”

 “So I misspoke yesterday,” she said. “I realize I made a mistake.”  Packham said.

How did the topic of credit reports come up in the discussion of the Affordable Care Act? 

According to HHS, some people are being asked during the enrollment process to link to a company named Experian to verify their identities.

Experian is a major provider of credit reports. But HHS is only using Experian’s services to verify identities and they say credit scores are not checked.

Packham wouldn’t say how she came up with such a detailed – and completely wrong – explanation for the question about credit checks.

Local 6 asked Packham, “People just want to know. You've been through training. You are educating people about the process. How does this happen?"

"It's human error," Packham said.