If you haven’t signed up for health insurance by March 31, you’ll likely face a penalty.
The thing is, a lot of the uninsured don’t seem to know that the deadline is March 31. Kantar Media says insurance companies are now devoting almost half of all their ad spending to commercials with a health reform theme.
Insurers are also giving financial support to some grassroots groups, like Enroll America. It’s organizing 3,000 enrollment events just in March aimed at getting people to sign up on one of the healthcare exchanges. The Service Employees International Union is also spreading the word, going door to door and making phone calls. “So far we’ve had 274,000 direct conversations but we want to pump that number up,” says SEIU International President Mary Kay Henry.
Both groups are focusing on states like Texas and Florida, which aren’t too keen on the Affordable Care Act but have lots of uninsured residents.