Health-form errors add to tax-season hassle

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

It’s not uncommon to feel some trepidation around tax-filing season.

But there’s an added hassle this year for nearly a million consumers who got financial help with health insurance premiums under President Barack Obama’s law.

The government sent consumers erroneous information on forms that they need to complete their 2014 tax returns.

Now these people are getting robocalls and emails advising them to delay filing until the mistakes are fixed.

Some are taking it in stride. Others wonder what else could go wrong.

“It’s been a comedy of errors from the start,” said K.C. Crafts, a freelance financial writer from South Berwick, Maine.

The mistake the government made affected 800,000 customers receiving subsidized health coverage through the federal insurance market. Some states running their own insurance exchanges also have had tax-form troubles.

In the federal case, 2015 premiums were substituted for what should have been 2014 numbers on new tax forms called 1095-As. Those forms are like W-2s for people who got subsidized health insurance — building blocks for filing an accurate tax return.

Crafts said her form has another error as well, potentially more serious. The coverage dates are wrong, and the result makes it appear as if she and her husband got much more in subsidies than they actually received. Maine is one of the 37 states served by HealthCare.gov, which is run by the Department of Health and Human Services.

The Obama administration says it’s trying to figure out what caused the broader mistake, even as it rushes corrected information to affected taxpayers.