Good news for Upper Valley consumers shopping during the open enrollment period that began Nov. 15 for health insurance coverage required by the Affordable Care Act: It appears that help is readily available.

Consider navigator Sandy Singer of Capstone Community Action in Randolph. During last years enrollment, she worked with hundreds of people who needed help finding insurance. Most chose to get covered, and about 95 percent of those who bought private insurance qualified for subsidies to offset the cost of premiums, Singer said. Others discovered that they were eligible for free care through Medicaid. A handful chose not to be insured but did it in an informed way.

Singer, who worked as a disaster case manager after Tropical Storm Irene, characterized the navigation work as challenging and extraordinarily rewarding. On Wednesday, just returned from a trip to California, Singer saw six clients in person and spoke to an additional 30 on the telephone. Im all warmed up, she said.

For many consumers, finding help represents the first step toward realizing the ACAs promise of improved health and health care and expanded access to health insurance. But expect a long and sometimes challenging journey. The ACA tries to address complex problems and, even when it works as intended, rarely delivers simple solutions.

Consumers may find themselves puzzling over what kind of help to seek: in-person, online or over the phone? Free or for a fee? Government-trained and certified counselor or broker or, perhaps, a call center or website advertised on television or found through an Internet search?

Some parts are simple. Consumers are required to have coverage that takes effect on Jan. 1. The last day to buy that coverage is Dec. 15. People who miss that deadline can buy coverage until Feb. 15. At that point, plans sold through the online exchanges established by the ACA will only be available to new customers who have experienced certain life events such as a job loss.

While individuals and families can buy insurance in other venues, shopping on the online exchanges can matter to those who have financial worries. Only plans sold on the exchanges are eligible for the sometimes hefty subsidies available to consumers with qualifying incomes and without health insurance coverage through employment.

The ACAs so-called individual mandate the requirement that most Americans have health insurance took effect this year. In the initial enrollment period that began a little over a year ago, helpers played a crucial role. That was largely because of numerous glitches and breakdowns in the websites that were created as marketplaces for insurance shopping by individuals who lacked employment-based health insurance or coverage by Medicare or Medicaid.

This year that bottleneck seems to have eased. Vermont Health Connect, the state-operated site serving residents of the Green Mountain State, and healthcare.gov, the federal site serving New Hampshire residents, have held up much better during their sophomore seasons, according to most accounts.

But help remains important. More often than not, health insurance for Americans comes with a plethora of puzzling particulars: deductibles, co-pays, out-of-pocket maximums, pre-certification of care, preferred provider versus health maintenance organizations, health savings accounts the list goes on.

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Advocates Help With Health Care