Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowWellPoint Inc.’s chronic computer problems have caused the Indianapolis-based insurer to be banned from enrolling customers in Medicare drug plans, Bloomberg reported this afternoon.
A spokesman for the government program told Bloomberg the computer glitches are putting patients at risk.
The sanctions were disclosed to WellPoint today in a letter from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
In October, Indianapolis’ St. Francis hospital system declared WellPoint in breach of its contract because of habitually late payments caused by computer snafus.
The technology issues already have helped to wipe out the Indianapolis-based health insurer’s expected profit growth for the year. And some analysts fear WellPoint will continue to lose customers and market share until the end of 2009.
This story will be updated.
Please enable JavaScript to view this content.