Exchange Data Hub Crashes

The troubled roll-out of the Obama administration’s health-care overhaul faced mounting problems when a key computer service failed Sunday.


The troubled roll-out of the Obama administration’s health-care overhaul faced mounting problems when a key computer service failed Sunday, two days after the government said its insurance exchange website would take another month to function smoothly.

The data services hub, a system that supplies tax information to websites run by the U.S. and 14 states to sell medical coverage, was unavailable yesterday evening after a malfunction at the center that hosts it.

The center, operated by Verizon Communications Inc. unit Terremark, lost connectivity after workers tried to replace a broken networking component, Joanne Peters, U.S. Health and Human Services Department spokeswoman, wrote in an e-mail. Peters didn’t say when the failure happened or how long it would take to repair.

“Our engineers have been working with HHS and other technology companies to identify and address the root cause of the issue,” Jeffrey Nelson, a spokesman for New York-based Verizon, said in a phone interview. “It will be fixed as quickly as possible.”

Nelson also declined to say when the breakdown occurred.

Kathleen Sebelius, the U.S. health secretary, spoke with Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam about the failure yesterday, her agency said in a statement.

The Obama administration has been under fire since Oct. 1 for persistent problems with the computer systems assembled to help people compare and enroll in insurance plans under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. President Barack Obama appointed his incoming chief economic adviser, Jeffrey Zients, to advise the health department on fixes to the system last week.

36 states

The federal site, which Zients declared “fixable,” serves consumers in 36 states, including Texas and Florida. Websites run by most of the 14 states that chose to build their own have run better than the federal site, although all of the sites rely to some extent on the data services hub, which was built by a UnitedHealth Group Inc. unit, Quality Software Services Inc.

A notice on the federal website yesterday evening warned visitors that the system was down.

“We are experiencing technical difficulties and hope to have them resolved soon,” the notice said. “Please try again later. In a hurry? You might be able to apply faster at our Marketplace call center. Call 1-800-318-2596 to talk with one of our trained representatives about applying over the phone.”

Repair schedule

Zients said Oct. 25 that the federal website, called healthcare.gov, will function smoothly for most customers by the end of November and named QSSI as the system’s lead contractor, taking over a decision-making role formerly filled by officials at the U.S. Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Matt Stearns, a spokesman for Minnetonka, Minnesota-based UnitedHealth, didn’t respond yesterday to an e-mail asking about the failure.

Since opening Oct. 1, the federal exchange has been plagued by delays, error messages and hang-ups that have prevented many customers from completing applications. Zients’s statement that there will be a monthlong wait to repair the federal exchange set off new calls for the president to ease a key deadline for consumers to sign up.

Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat who voted for the health law in 2010, is among 10 Democratic U.S. senators who wrote the administration to ask that the six-month enrollment period be lengthened. The call for the delay is linked to provisions in the law that require all health plans to be compliant by January with new regulations, including a prohibition against charging sick people more than healthy customers. Plans must also provide expanded benefits including free preventative care.

Enrollment deadline

If the exchange website remains troubled until the beginning of December, consumers who wait will have less than a month to change their health coverage. The enrollment deadline to have coverage effective Jan. 1 is Dec. 15. Insurers this month began sending out notices that they are canceling current plans, forcing customers to sign up for new plans compliant with the health law.

Consumers can use the websites to sign up for new coverage, when they work, or call telephone services or fill out paper applications. People facing cancellation may be able to enroll in new plans from their current carriers, which may cost more unless the customers qualify for government subsidies.

Connecticut website

Connecticut’s independent state exchange, known as Access Health CT, notified consumers in the early evening that their site would be partially disabled.

“Customers will not be able to access Remote Identity Proofing, Social Security Administration or Advanced Premium Tax Credits also referred to as subsidies,” wrote Kathleen Tallarita, a spokeswoman for the state site, in a statement today. “As a result, consumers will not be able to complete the sign up process for Medicaid or Advanced Premium Tax Credit determinations.”

The tax credits reduce the cost of insurance for anyone earning less than about four times the poverty level, or about $94,000 for a family of four.

Connecticut consumers can continue to create accounts as well as shop anonymously and compare prices for plans, Tallarita said.