Monday Is Deadline to Sign Up for Obamacare
Monday Is Deadline to Sign Up for Obamacare
WebMD News from HealthDay
MONDAY, March 31, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Today is the deadline for most people to sign up for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, the controversial healthcare-reform law.
More than 6 million Americans have already signed up for insurance coverage through online "marketplaces" created by the law, federal officials said on Thursday.
Earlier last week, the Obama administration said that Americans who've started applying for health insurance but can't complete the process by the March 31 deadline will be given an extension.
Administration officials said the extension was being offered partly out of concern that the federal online registration website, Healthcare.gov, could become overwhelmed as last-minute registrants scrambled to meet the original March 31 deadline or face a penalty in the form of a tax.
And that seemed to be the case early Monday morning as the website struggled with high user traffic. Some visitors to HealthCare.gov were met with messages that the site was down for maintenance. At times, visitors were sent to a virtual waiting room -- a feature created to ease the strain on the site during periods of heavy demand, the Associated Press reported.
Administration spokesman Aaron Albright said the website was back online shortly before 9 a.m., Eastern time, the AP reported.
The troubled unveiling of HealthCare.gov last fall is still fresh in many people's memories, as computer glitches and software problems made the website almost unusable for long periods of time. Critics of the Affordable Care Act pounced on the troubled launch, which was deeply embarrassing to President Barack Obama. The health reform law, sometimes called Obamacare, is considered Obama's signature domestic achievement.
The federal website, which serves 36 states that do not operate their own registration websites, has been operating well for months, according to White House officials. But it had more than 1 million visitors each day several days last week. With the prospect of high visitor traffic leading up to March 31, the Obama administration said it wanted to avoid a repeat of last fall's problems with the website.
But White House officials have granted extension to those who can't complete the process on time
WebMD News from HealthDay
Monday Is Deadline to Sign Up for Obamacare
More than 6 million Americans have already signed up for insurance coverage through online "marketplaces" created by the law, federal officials said on Thursday.
Earlier last week, the Obama administration said that Americans who've started applying for health insurance but can't complete the process by the March 31 deadline will be given an extension.
Administration officials said the extension was being offered partly out of concern that the federal online registration website, Healthcare.gov, could become overwhelmed as last-minute registrants scrambled to meet the original March 31 deadline or face a penalty in the form of a tax.
And that seemed to be the case early Monday morning as the website struggled with high user traffic. Some visitors to HealthCare.gov were met with messages that the site was down for maintenance. At times, visitors were sent to a virtual waiting room -- a feature created to ease the strain on the site during periods of heavy demand, the Associated Press reported.
Administration spokesman Aaron Albright said the website was back online shortly before 9 a.m., Eastern time, the AP reported.
The troubled unveiling of HealthCare.gov last fall is still fresh in many people's memories, as computer glitches and software problems made the website almost unusable for long periods of time. Critics of the Affordable Care Act pounced on the troubled launch, which was deeply embarrassing to President Barack Obama. The health reform law, sometimes called Obamacare, is considered Obama's signature domestic achievement.
The federal website, which serves 36 states that do not operate their own registration websites, has been operating well for months, according to White House officials. But it had more than 1 million visitors each day several days last week. With the prospect of high visitor traffic leading up to March 31, the Obama administration said it wanted to avoid a repeat of last fall's problems with the website.
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