Blues ease rate hike for 163,000

Attorney General Mike Cox has agreed raise rates 22% for 163,000 Michigan Blue Cross customers who buy their own health insurance instead of the 56% one year increase originally sought by the company.

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan has reached an agreement with Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox to lower its request to raise rates for 163,000 people who buy their own health insurance.

But the company and Cox could not reach agreement about a 31% rate hike that affects 210,000 seniors with supplemental Medicare plans. The next hearing in that challenge is scheduled for Sept. 14.

It was not known when the increases will take effect because the agreement must be approved by Michigan's Office of Financial and Insurance Services, which is expected.

If approved, so called non-group or individual policies would increase 22%, not the 56% average increase Blue Cross originally sought.

Group conversion policies purchased by people to replace workplace coverage they once had would be increased on average 22%, not 41% as Blue Cross originally requested.

The savings, on average, mean that a person's individual coverage will increase $47 a month, instead of $122 a month, and group conversion policies would increase $53 a month, instead of $99 a month for a single person.

Family coverage for individual policies will increase $101 a month, not $257 a month as Blue Cross had initially sought, and $107 a month for families with group conversion coverage, down from a $231 in the original request.

Blue Cross has said it needs the rate hikes because it faces losses of more than $1 billion through 2011 on its individual policies. It wants state changes to require more commercial insurers to take all applicants, as it is required, to spread the burden of providing insurance to the sickest, costliest people.

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