"How do I get an exemption from the fee for not having health coverage?" - from Healthcare.gov

[kestrel91316]

https://www.healthcare.gov/exemptions/

Starting 2014, most people must have health coverage or pay a fee (the “individual shared responsibility payment”). You can get an exemption in certain cases.

The individual shared responsibility payment
If you can afford health insurance but choose not to buy it, you must pay a fee known as the individual shared responsibility payment.

The fee in 2014 is 1% of your yearly income or $95 per person for the year, whichever is higher. The fee increases every year. In 2016 it is 2.5% of income or $695 per person, whichever is higher.

In 2014 the payment for uninsured children is $47.50 per child. The most a family would have to pay in 2014 is $285.

You make the payment when you file your 2014 taxes, which are due in April 2015.

Exemptions from the payment
Under certain circumstances, you won’t have to make the individual responsibility payment. This is called an “exemption.”

You may qualify for an exemption if:

You’re uninsured for less than 3 months of the year
The lowest-priced coverage available to you would cost more than 8% of your household income
You don’t have to file a tax return because your income is too low (Learn about the filing limit.)
You’re a member of a federally recognized tribe or eligible for services through an Indian Health Services provider
You’re a member of a recognized health care sharing ministry
You’re a member of a recognized religious sect with religious objections to insurance, including Social Security and Medicare
You’re incarcerated, and not awaiting the disposition of charges against you
You’re not lawfully present in the U.S.
Hardship exemptions
If you have any of the circumstances below that affect your ability to purchase health insurance coverage, you may qualify for a “hardship” exemption:

You were homeless.
You were evicted in the past 6 months or were facing eviction or foreclosure.
You received a shut-off notice from a utility company.
You recently experienced domestic violence.
You recently experienced the death of a close family member.
You experienced a fire, flood, or other natural or human-caused disaster that caused substantial damage to your property.
You filed for bankruptcy in the last 6 months.
You had medical expenses you couldn’t pay in the last 24 months.
You experienced unexpected increases in necessary expenses due to caring for an ill, disabled, or aging family member.
You expect to claim a child as a tax dependent who’s been denied coverage in Medicaid and CHIP, and another person is required by court order to give medical support to the child. In this case, you do not have the pay the penalty for the child.
As a result of an eligibility appeals decision, you’re eligible for enrollment in a qualified health plan (QHP) through the Marketplace, lower costs on your monthly premiums, or cost-sharing reductions for a time period when you weren’t enrolled in a QHP through the Marketplace.
You were determined ineligible for Medicaid because your state didn’t expand eligibility for Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act.
How to apply for an exemption
If you are applying for an exemption based on: coverage being unaffordable; membership in a health care sharing ministry; membership in a federally-recognized tribe; or being incarcerated:

You have two options--

You can claim these exemptions when you fill out your 2014 federal tax return, which is due in April 2015
You can apply for the exemptions in the Health Insurance Marketplace
Note: If you get an exemption because coverage is unaffordable based on your expected income, you may also qualify to buy catastrophic coverage through the Marketplace. This may be more affordable than your other options.

If you’re applying for an exemption based on: membership in a recognized religious sect whose members object to insurance; eligibility for services through an Indian health care provider; or one of the hardships described above:

You fill out an exemption application in the Marketplace
If your income will be low enough that you will not be required to file taxes:

You don’t need to apply for an exemption. This is true even if you file a return in order to get a refund of money withheld from your paycheck. You won’t have to make the shared responsibility payment.
If you have a gap in coverage of less than 3 months, or you are not lawfully present in the U.S.:

You don’t need to apply for an exemption. This will be handled when you file your taxes.

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Now stop with the endless whining and carping about the goddamned mandate.

[Lucinda]

1. Thankie!

[grantcart]

2. All I want is "How do I get onto my health care account"

Three straight days and it is still a wait and problems logging in.

Wait time on phone calls is down from 45 minutes to 5 minutes but still can't log on.

I'm not complaining cause I know that its going slow because there millions trying to do the exact same thing.

[leftstreet]

3. This is so sad

All this policy planning for avoiding a penalty fee should have gone into finding ways to help people who can't afford it actually get care

Sad

[pnwmom]

4. It did. That's why Medicaid was greatly expanded

and that's why there are subsidies for both premiums and out-of-pocket costs.

Some people will fall through the cracks, but a lot fewer than before. And it's not Obama's fault or any of the Democrats that the Rethugs are fighting Medicaid in some states and won't work to help improve the ACA.

[leftstreet]

5. But no rules to keep states from opting out

Yeah, yeah I know. Supreme Court blah blah blah

If your legislation is so lame it can't withstand a SC ruling you should scrap it and start over

[Whisp]

8. we lost a kitty today

watch your kitties, kiddies.

[FSogol]

11. LOL. n/t

[frazzled]

6. I think you maybe don't understand how this works

In order for universal coverage to exist, and to keep the costs down for everyone, you have to achieve near universal enrollment. There are numerous things built into this policy to allow people to afford insurance who otherwise couldn't: generous subsidies to reduce the cost and help pay for it, expansion of Medicaid to include more of the truly poor*, etc.

We can't leave it up to people to decide whether they can afford it. Can you afford a cell phone plan with unlimited talk, data, and messaging but not insurance? Can you afford cable television or Netflix streaming but not insurance? What comes first? We have to have a formula that applies to all, based on income and family size, and we have to have a penalty for those who qualify by income and size but decide not to buy in. Otherwise, many would choose not to ... and then we'd have the same old problems with costs incurred that have to be distributed to the rest of the system.

For those people who fall through the cracks for some reason (and they're probably relatively rare), these categories exist to exempt them from the penalty. That's pretty generous, too.

People who never could afford to get care can now afford to get care in the system. People who do not want to will have to pay their fare share to the system. And after all that, when all is said and done, those who have an exigency are dismissed from the system.


*For those nasty states (R) that have refused to expand Medicaid, this is a problem. And these exemptions will hopefully help people hurt by the Republican backlash to avoid costs, for now. Hopefully, those states will come into line in the coming months and years.

[leftstreet]

7. Wrong. The ACA isn't single payer nonprofit

There are NO mechanisms in the ACA to 'keep costs down'

[kestrel91316]

9. Er, you probably are forgetting about the rule that insurance companies MUST spend most (80%??) of

their premiums on actual medical care for insured and refund money to them if they don't. There's a cost control right there.

Yes, single payer will be better. But we aren't there YET.

[frazzled]

10. Yes, there are cost-containment provisions in the ACA

Of course, the Republicans ditched the best ones, but there are still numerous measures in it, and more that need to be built in in the coming years as the program settles in. This is what left-economist Christina Romer argues, outlining the various cost-containing measures and asking that more be added in the future:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/22/business/health-care-law-and-cost-containment-economic-view.html?_r=0

[kestrel91316]

12. You're not a stupid person. Why do you keep posting this nonsense and then not acknowledging when

someone shows that you are mistaken and overreacting??

[Puzzledtraveller]

13. It's pathetic

This whitewash of what basically is the Health Insurance Industry bailout.