Avoid Telephone Scams That Use eHealth’s Name

eHealth has learned of consumers receiving unsolicited telephone calls from imposters offering health insurance and falsely claiming to be affiliated with eHealth, its website www.eHealthInsurance.com or www.eHealth.com, and certain health insurance companies that work with eHealth. 

These calls are fraudulent and are not being placed by, or at the direction of, eHealth. We believe the purpose of such calls is either to sell something in a misleading manner or to steal  personal information or money. Such fraud is often called “phishing” and is, of course, illegal.  eHealth has reported these incidents to relevant government authorities and is otherwise investigating the source of this fraud.

These imposter calls often spoof the caller ID number shown to the call recipient so the call appears to be from a phone number in the call recipient’s area code, and in some cases the caller ID may even be spoofed to show the legitimate customer service number of a real business like eHealth. There are sometimes many such calls within a single day. Such scam callers generally do not honor do-not-call requests.

eHealth advises consumers to not provide their personal information, credit or debit card numbers, or other important details to anyone on an unsolicited telephone call.

Legitimate eHealth Calls
If you want to ensure you are talking to eHealth, you can call us at 1-844-578-1914 or otherwise use the contact information we display on www.ehealthinsurance.com.

As a general practice, eHealth does not call consumers unless the consumer has requested to receive a call, or eHealth is calling to provide customer care to someone we’ve already spoken with or with whom we otherwise have a relationship. 

In addition, it is eHealth’s policy that if we receive a request that eHealth not call again, then eHealth will place that telephone number on eHealth’s internal do-not-call list. You may make such a request either by speaking with an eHealth representative or by emailing your telephone number to donotcall@ehealth.com.

eHealth is a public company that takes legal compliance and privacy issues seriously. Our privacy policy is certified by TRUSTe, an industry leader in consumer privacy assurance.

What To Do If You’re A Victim
If you believe you are a victim of a telephone scam and have given out your personal or payment information, there are steps you can take.  Contact your financial institutions immediately to report your suspicions.  In many instances, you can ask your financial institutions to impose a password protection to prevent the unauthorized release of funds.  If you provided any passwords, change your passwords as well.

You can also place a security freeze or a fraud alert on your credit report to prevent new accounts from being opened with your personal information. A security freeze prohibits a credit reporting agency from releasing any information from your credit report without your written permission. You should be aware, however, that placing a security freeze on your credit report may delay, interfere with, or prevent the timely approval of any requests you make for new loans, credit, mortgages, employment, housing, or other services. A fraud alert helps protect you against the possibility of an identity thief opening new credit accounts in your name.  When a merchant checks the credit history of someone applying for credit, the merchant gets a notice that the applicant may be the victim of identity theft.  The alert notifies the merchant to take steps to verify the identity of the applicant.

To place a security freeze on your credit report, you may send a written request to the three credit reporting agencies.  To add a fraud alert, you may call the credit reporting agencies. 

Further details regarding how to place a fraud alert or security freeze on your credit reports, including the contract information of the three nationwide credit bureaus, are available at the website of the Federal Trade Commission.

If you believe your identity has been stolen, the Federal Trade Commission recommends that you take these additional steps:

  • Close the accounts that you have confirmed or believe have been tampered with or fraudulently opened.  Fill in and submit the Federal Trade Commission’s Identity Theft Affidavit available at www.ftc.gov/idtheft when you dispute new unauthorized accounts.
  • File a local police report.  Obtain a copy of the police report and submit it to your creditors and any others that may require proof of the identity theft crime.

For more information about how to protect yourself from becoming a victim of identity theft, contact the FTC at:

Federal Trade Commission
Consumer Response Center
600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20580
www.ftc.gov/idtheft/

Reporting Incidents to eHealth
If you have experienced these fraudulent calls and wish to provide to eHealth details of your experience, which may help us to identify the scammers, please click here.  Your report will be helpful if you can provide: (i) the exact dates and times of the calls you received from someone claiming to be eHealth, (ii) the caller ID and other information displayed during the calls, (iii) the telephone number where you received the calls, (iv) the telephone  carrier for that telephone number, and (v) what the caller said to indicate an affiliation with eHealth.