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Regulators, insurers spar over access to payer contracts in Section 7 discussion
Summary
At an April 25 House Health Care committee meeting, the Department of Financial Regulation said it already has authority to obtain insurers’ contracts while Cigna and other insurers urged restoring confidentiality language in Section 7 to protect competitively sensitive terms.
Members of the House Health Care committee on April 25 discussed Section 7 of a bill that would change who can access health insurers’ contracts and whether confidentiality clauses should be limited.
Mary Black, Director of Insurance Regulation for the Department of Financial Regulation, told the committee the department “already have this authority” to request contracts from regulated entities and does not believe the Section 7 language is needed but “would not object” to restoring struck confidentiality language after hearing from insurers.
Christine Cooney, state government affairs manager for Cigna, said her company supports the bill’s broader goal of addressing rising health-care costs but raised objections to the Section 7 wording that would limit confidentiality protections. “The contract information we consider competitively sensitive,” Cooney said, arguing that removing confidentiality could “impact competitiveness, and have that unintended consequence of driving up prices.” She also noted most of Cigna’s Vermont business is self-insured but that the company supports over 3,000 fully insured commercial members in the state.
Committee members and insurer representatives discussed the practical scope of regulator access. Black said DFR can request contracts during examinations or investigations — including contracts with third-party vendors — and has done so in targeted instances, though not routinely. She said DFR has requested provider contracts for Blue Cross in the past when related to financial or solvency concerns and that such requests can extend to nondomestic insurers when relevant to an examination.
Insurer speakers also raised questions about the Green Mountain Care Board’s scope. Cooney asked whether the board’s ability to access contracts is “limited to the scope of a rate-making decision,” and another insurer representative said the board generally requests information in the context of rate reviews but asks for information throughout the year. Committee members noted the bill’s Section 7 would be broader than rate-review authority if enacted as written.
Committee members also touched briefly on Section 10, which would change integrated data provisions; Cooney said she shared some concerns similar to those expressed by Blue Cross about data sharing and potential duplication with existing reporting to regulators and the all-payer claims database.
No formal vote on Section 7 was recorded in the transcript. The record reflects discussion among state regulators, insurer lobbyists and committee members weighing regulatory access against insurer concerns about confidentiality and competitive harm.
The committee paused the item after the discussion and moved on to other business.
