Enrollment for Obamacare is right around the corner

Second enrollment period begins Nov. 15

LA CROSSE, Wis. (WKBT) — Open enrollment for health care under the Affordable Care Act begins Nov. 15.

After the rocky rollout last fall of the Obama Care website, officials hope to add to the 7.3 million enrolled, the second time around.

“Anybody who does not have insurance today, or anybody who has purchased on the market place last year, or if your employer does not provide you health insurance today should go to the market place to check that out,” Michael Richards the executive  director of external affairs at Gundersen Health System, said.

Open enrollment for health care begins the Nov. 15…it takes about fifteen days to be processed so enroll no later than Dec.15 if you want to be enrolled by the new year. The enrollment period will last through Feb. 15.  

If you are already enrolled you can be automatically re-enrolled but experts urge consumers to not put their insurance on auto pilot.

“Ask questions before you do anything, I think that’s the most important part, we don’t want people to re-enroll if they want to go back and look at other plans that are available so it’s important for people to just look at the different option and ask for help if needed,” Richards said.

Richards said it’s important to actively re-new your plans so you can update any details about your changes in income if you don’t it could hurt you later.

“Your income level will determine any subsidy that you’re going to get, so any kind of changes that you’re going to have you’re going to want to make sure you report that, if you don’t what going to happen is they’ll make sure they make up for it in the back end at the end of the year during tax season,” Richards, said.

Under Affordable Care Act Rules, the Penalty for being uninsured in 2015 is $325 or two percent of your yearly income.