Health Reform to Require Insurers to Use Plain Language in Describing Health Plan Benefits, Coverage

February 8, 2012

  http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2012pres/02/20120209a.html

Under the rule, health insurers must provide consumers with clear, consistent and comparable summary information about their health plan benefits and coverage. The new explanations, which will be available beginning, or soon after, September 23, 2012 will be a critical resource for the roughly 150 million Americans with private health insurance today.

Specifically, these rules will ensure consumers have access to two key documents that will help them understand and evaluate their health insurance choices:

• A short, easy-to-understand Summary of Benefits and Coverage ( or "SBC"); and
• A uniform glossary of terms commonly used in health insurance coverage, such as "deductible" and "co-payment."