This Medicare Open Enrollment Season, More Seniors Are Expected to Seek Online Help

With COVID cases rising across the United States, seniors are reluctant to seek help in person. Consequently, more Medicare open enrollees are expected to go online for assistance, reports CNBC News . Humana said it will offer socially distanced, in-person appointments with agents, "based on the guidance of local health officials," while UnitedHealth Group is transitioning enrollment to an online format. "We hold a lot of community meetings across the country during open enrollment . . . (but) we're expecting to do many more of those in a virtual setting," said UnitedHealthcare Medicare and Retirement plans CEO Tim Noel. Online health insurance brokerages are anticipating a boom in demand for phone consultations when Medicare open enrollment begins soon. They have been expanding their staff over the summer, moving agents from call centers to home-based systems, as well as revamping their websites. "We're going to try to leverage technology as much as possible to the process to make things more efficient . . . with things like voice signatures for people completing an application, and DocuSign capability in multiple languages that allow our brokers to complete sales without having to interact in a face-to-face environment," said GoHealth CEO Clint Jones. Finally, eHealth is rolling out a new customer center where Medicare enrollees can organize a secure permanent profile with data about their current health plan, doctors, and medications to help make comparing new plan options easier.