Covered California Call Center Creates Jobs for East County Residents

Last week, the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors received an update regarding the Contra Costa County Covered California Call Center and implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

If you recall, the call center is an asset t the County because it will created hundreds of new jobs in the county upon full implementation. According to the report which highlighted the residency of staff, of the 119 employees, 47 people reside in East Contra Costa County while 84% of employees reside in Contra Costa County. The Next hiring wave planned for January 2014 to bring the total hires to over 200.

Peter Lee, Executive Director of the California Health Benefit Exchange stated that this program is making history as for the first time because we are saying healthcare is a right.

He stated Contra Costa County is a key partner in the program.

“When they are answering callers, in many ways they are answering prayers. They are the prayers of thousands of Californians that have been living without health insurance, thousands of Californians living in fear, thousands of Californians living in a point of what if something happens when I don’t have insurance,” explained Lee.

155-county employees are answering the phones helping Californians get affordable healthcare.

As of as of last week, Lee reported they are now 3-weeks into the launch of the call center and program, he explained:

• 2.2 million different individuals have been on our website.
• Our website is working and they are getting on. 125k applications have been started.
• 156k pick up phone and call in the Concord Center.
• 36,000 in Contra Costa County are now eligible for financial subsidies to pick a plan from both private or public to lower their cost.
•  Thousands are now eligible for medical.
• This means no one else can be turned away with pre-existing conditions—the rules are changing.

The Board of Supervisors thanked both Peter Lee and Kathy Gallagher, Employment and Human Services Director, for their efforts in implementation.

Supervisor Piepho asked for further clarification with the media reports.

“The Federal website is a real issue, can you touch on this as even the President is apologizing. Maybe you can dig a little bit deeper because it is a real issue and maybe not here and our website… what is the real truth?,” asked Piepho.

Lee explained that the Affordable Healthcare Act stated states can be their own exchanges and control your own destiny. Or states can let the federal Government handle it and set up their market place. California stepped up and took our own destiny into our hands. We have 17-states that are state based exchanges.

The only place to enroll in California is the Covered California website.

“I hear this website thing is not working. We are working fine in California,” said Lee. “We linked up to the Federal Hub and its working great. I was nervous 6-months ago because when they enroll they get real time information, that is happening seamlessly. The website stories doe n we are up and running today. You can enroll January 1.”

California is different because all three call centers will be staffed by public workers. We are the only state to have state public workers answer the phone. We are showing how Government is doing it right. It’s showing how we are doing good government.

It is estimated that during the initial, six-month open-enrollment period 500,000 to 700,000 Californians will be enrolled.

Here is a copy of what was in the two-page report.

Staffing:

• Approximately 129 Customer Service Agents, 91 Fulltime and 38 Intermittent. (65 CSA Is, 26 CSA IIs)
• Thirty-one (31) CSAs have left since our initial hire date of July 10, 2013 which  represents an attrition rate  of approximately 14.6% from the original 151 agents hired
  • Twenty-three (23) left for another job outside the county or for an undisclosed reason
  • Three (3) CSAs left to take another job within the county (Eligibility Worker positions)
  • Five (5) were rejected from probation
• Approximate total number of staff 155 – 11 Customer Service Agent Supervisors, 3 managers, 4 trainers, and 6 support positions. 1 support position is still pending.
• Wave 1 hiring is complete. No hiring completed during Wave 2. Next hiring wave planned for January 2014.
• Fulltime Employment Opportunities are posted each week and new information is distributed to staff daily as announced through Human Resources.
• Transportation Survey issued pending a response from staff October 2013
• Bilingual Spanish staff skilled at Open Enrollment. Approximately 31% of our CSAs are bilingual of which 20% are Spanish-speaking. Testing for additional languages pending with Human Resources.
• Approximately eighty-four percent (84%) of the CSAs live in Contra Costa County and 16% live in other contiguous counties. Of the 84% living in Contra Costa, approximately 15% of the CSAs reside in West County,  40% in Central County, and 33% in East/far-East County.
• Staff Morale has been high overall throughout the Soft “Go Live” as well as the first week of Open Enrollment

 Training:

• Four (4) weeks of initial State developed training completed.
• CalHEERS, Eligibility and Enrollment, Quick Sort Training completed September 2013.
• On-going customer service training for supervisors and agents planned at the facility.
• On-going quality assurance training conducted at the facility.

Operations:

• Soft “go-live” completed August through September 2013.
• Affordable Care Act, “Go Live” began October1, 2013 for Rancho Cordova and Contra 2Costa. Fresno “Go Live” November 2013.
• Hours of operation during open enrollment Monday – Friday, 8 am – 8 pm and Saturday 8 am – 6 pm (10/1/13 through 3/31/14).
• Several visits from Radio, TV and Print media prior to and during the first week of Open Enrollment
• Peter Lee’s 7Cs visit – August 12 and October 2, 2013

Performance:

• CalHEERS interface was not operable during first week of Open Enrollment
• An average of 1,230 calls received daily during Soft “Go Live” with a Service Level of 98%, exceeding our goal of 80%. Average Wait Time was 20 seconds and Average Speed of Answer was 0 seconds, exceeding our goal of answering calls within 30 seconds.
• Over 49,000 calls received during the first three days of Open Enrollment period. Service Level improved from 32.9% to 81%. Average Speed of Answer decreased from 44.24 minutes on October 1 to 7.38 minutes on October 3.
• Over 460 paper applications completed at Contra Costa site during first 3 days of Open Enrollment.

Below is a chart that shows the residency of staff.

http://www.pbtech.org/clients/CCBOS/agenda/cccbos10222013.html