Late rush before open enrollment deadline jams federal phone lines

Consumers anxious to beat the midnight Tuesday deadline to enroll on the federal insurance exchange overwhelmed call center lines Monday, federal officials said.

Some people were being asked to leave their names so they could be called back after the deadline to be enrolled. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said they would still be able to have coverage effective Jan. 1 if they left their contact information before the deadline.

"The energy is outpacing where we were last year ahead of the December 15 deadline," CMS spokeswoman Lori Lodes said in a statement. "More people are simultaneously shopping right now at HealthCare.gov than at any point this year or last year — and traffic continues to grow."

Ronnell Nolan, president of Health Agents for America, said the federal site had been down for more than two hours for some of her agents in and around Louisiana, but Lodes said in an email only that "some consumers may wait an average of less than 2 minutes to log-in."

Healthcare.gov, which is handling sign ups for 38 states, as of Friday has a fully functioning out-of-pocket cost calculator, as well as tools that allow consumers to look up whether doctors, hospitals and drugs are covered by different plans.

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