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Two companies consistently had the highest denial rates — John Alden Life Insurance and Time Insurance, both owned by Milwaukee-based Assurant Health. In nearly every market surveyed, their

denial rates were at least twice the rate of competing insurers. For example, in Tennessee, John Alden turned down 70% of applicants and Time, one of the biggest individual insurers in the

country, rejected 53%. Assurant spokeswoman Heather McAvoy said her company offers alternative plans when applicants are rejected due to health status. These can include policies that

require consumers to pay extra to cover a pre-existing medical condition. "Unfortunately, when consumers accept the alternative coverage — and are, in fact, insured with Assurant Health

— they are classified as a 'denial' under the HHS criteria," she said. AHIP, the trade group, says the federal data on coverage denials are misleading because they do not

include people rejected for one plan but offered another. The data also include denials involving applicants who don't live in the plan's coverage area. The Department of Health

and Human Services acknowledged AHIP's arguments but said it was important for the data to reflect when people can't get the specific policies they apply for. The department said

most of the denials are the result of medical underwriting. HEALTH CARE OVERHAUL OFFERS HELP The difficulty of buying individual coverage was a big reason behind the 2010 federal health

overhaul, which will ban insurers starting in 2014 from denying individual policies based on health status. In the past, most consumers haven't been able to look up insurers'

denial rates before sending in a check to apply for coverage. Maryland is the only state that requires insurers to report information on denial rates. But as part of the federal health law,

HHS last November started posting the coverage-denial rates, which can be searched by ZIP code at www.healthcare.gov. Using the data from the website, a Government Accountability Office

study of 459 insurers published earlier this year found an average of 19% of applicants nationally were denied coverage. But the study showed a wide range of denial rates. A quarter of

insurers had denial rates of 15% or below and a quarter had rates of 40% or higher. A House Energy and Commerce Committee investigation into four large for-profit insurers last year found

that the denial rates have steadily increased from 11.9% in 2007 to 15.3% in 2009. The companies reviewed were Aetna, Humana, UnitedHealthcare and WellPoint. The denial rates are an

important tool for helping consumers select an insurer, said Deborah Chollet, a senior fellow with Mathematica, a non-partisan think tank. That's because the application process can

take a month or more, and carriers typically require the first month's premium with the application. Sara Collins, vice president of the non-partisan Commonwealth Fund, said the denial

data underscore the need for the industry changes that will occur in 2014. "It's not surprising that denial rates are high, because insurers have an incentive to only enroll the

healthy risks," she said. "If a person comes in with a health problem that will potentially cost (the insurer) money, they are probably not going to cover them." _Kaiser

Health News is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-profit, non-partisan health policy research and communication organization not affiliated

with Kaiser Permanente. This article was produced in collaboration with USA Today._