(1) gather info about the applicant, sufficient to be able to determine what plans he is eligible for, and what the price would be. Under the law, his medical history would not be a factor, only things like age, sex, and residence location.Where they made it complicated was in wanting to prevent his seeing the plans, and their prices, until AFTER he had entered all the info to determine the subsidy, and making sure that reporters couldn't get at the pricing info by repeatedly entering different locations, ages, and sex.(2) gather info about his finances to determine how big a subsidy he would be eligible for.
(3) verify the financial info given with various government entities to validate his eligibility.
It would have simplified things greatly if they allowed people to see the prices, decide if they wanted Obamacare, and THEN enter the financial info. The financial info verification could have happened asynchronously overnight. They then could have logged in the next day and gotten what their subsidy would be, or arrange to have it emailed.
Yes, and that's further proof that they are not only incompetent but evil.
There was absolutely no need to require an applicant to identify himself merely to review the choices.