Undercover agents get health insurance subsidies with fake IDs

Jul 24 2014

Federal investigators, working undercover for the Government Accountability Office, said they had been able to obtain subsidized health insurance under the health law using fictitious identities and false documents. The administration said it was working on remedying the verification problems.

The New York Times: Investigators Detail Missteps In Verification For Health Care
Federal investigators working undercover said Tuesday that they had been able to obtain subsidized health insurance under the Affordable Care Act using fictitious identities and false documents. The investigators, from the Government Accountability Office, said their tests indicated the Obama administration was not adequately verifying information submitted by applicants (7/22).

The Washington Post: Federal Undercover Investigation Signs Up Fake Applicants For ACA Coverage
The results of the inquiry by the Government Accountability Office are evidence of still-imperfect work by specialists intended to assist new insurance customers as well as government contractors hired to verify that coverage and subsidies are legitimate. The GAO also pointed to flaws that linger in the marketplace's website, healthcare.gov (Goldstein, 7/22).

The Wall Street Journal: Fictitious Applicants Able To Get U.S. Health-Insurance Tax Credits
The investigation will be the focus of a House Ways and Means subcommittee hearing Wednesday on the potential for waste and fraud in the subsidies. Republicans opposed to the health law say the GAO's findings are evidence of the government's inability to verify information, which they say creates the potential for fraud and abuse (Armour, 7/22).

The Associated Press: Agents Get Subsidized 'Obamacare' Using Fake IDs
Undercover investigators using fake identities were able to secure taxpayer-subsidized health insurance under President Barack Obama's health care law. The weak link in the system seemed to be call centers that handled applications for thousands of consumers unable to get through online (7/23).

NBC News: GAO Sting Finds It Easy to Fake It, Get Obamacare Premiums
Eleven out of 12 fake applications for government-subsidized health insurance got through a verification process and the bogus beneficiaries are still covered, the Government Accountability Office said Tuesday. The GAO launched the sting to check to see how well the Obamacare process checks for counterfeit applications. The results were messy, GAO's Seto Bagdoyan says in testimony prepared for a hearing Wednesday of the House Ways and Means oversight subcommittee (Fox and Seidman, 7/23).