Obamacare Website: Numeric Measures Of Progress

Technical problems are proving persistent and widespread. "Marilyn Tavenner, the head of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the site's manager, told a Senate panel earlier this week that the technology is improving daily, and now can register 17,000 customers per hour "with almost no errors."...Where a month ago users weren't even able to create an account, now most can register, submit an application and view plans, he said. The breakdown comes when users try to select a plan and make a purchase, he said. The entire process is still slow and "takes a lot of time on the computer," McKinney said." Shannon Pettypiece and Alex Wayne in Bloomberg.

Healthcare.gov is testing Jeff Zients, a tycoon and a tinkerer. "Zients is witnessing that ineptitude up close as the emergency fix-it man charged with righting HealthCare.gov, the bungled online marketplace for medical insurance...Administration officials say Mr. Zients has intensified the pace at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the agency responsible for the website...Among other immediate changes, Mr. Zients recommended that the agency hire a general contractor to coordinate repairs, started daily telephone news briefings and instituted at the command center morning and evening "stand up meetings."...He said response times -- how long users wait for a page to load -- now average less than one second, down from eight seconds. The error rate -- how often system failures prevent users from advancing to the next page -- is 2 percent, down from 6 percent, Mr. Zients said." Sheryl Gay Stolberg in The New York Times.