The Bowdoin Orient

Due to an IT glitch, more than 30 Bowdoin students who had waived the College's health insurance were mistakenly charged for it this summer.

Bowdoin provides an insurance plan to students through a third-party administrator, Gallagher Koster. Last year, insurance companies Gallagher and Koster merged, and subsequently created a new Web site to improve customer service.

However, Margaret Hazlett, senior associate dean of student affairs, noted that "there were some glitches."

According to Student Health Insurance Coordinator Leslie Nuccio, the Web browser didn't capture the information when people submitted the waiver to be exempt from Bowdoin health insurance. Though Gallagher Koster was able to contact most of these people, more than 30 families were inadvertently charged for the health insurance by the College.

Since Bowdoin requires that all students have health insurance, they have a hard-waiver policy, which automatically enrolls all students in the Gallagher Koster plan unless they go online and waive the policy. According to Nuccio, about 90 percent of colleges utilize the hard-waiver policy.

"It is the most efficient and effective way to ensure all students have health insurance," said Hazlett.

About 25 percent of Bowdoin students purchased the Bowdoin insurance plan last year. The annual cost of the plan for a student in 2008-2009 is $1,050.

As of now, all families that Bowdoin has been in contact with have resolved the problem with Gallagher Koster.

"They had to do the work to resolve it," said Nuccio, "but it certainly created more work for myself and the Bursar's office."

The Bursar's office, Hazlett explained, has been working to make certain that people weren't being billed or credited wrongly.

On Wednesday, Gallagher Koster representatives met with Hazlett, Nuccio, Director of Health Services Sandra Hayes, and Jim Kelley, who works in the Treasurer's office as the procurement and risk manager, to discuss the issue.

"They've been very responsive," said Hazlett.

-Gemma Leghorn contributed to this report.

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