Federal officials say they're on track for HealthCare.gov to be functional by deadline

With just two weeks left before a self-imposed deadline to have HealthCare.gov functioning smoothly for the “vast majority” of users, Obama administration officials continue to insist they're on target to meet that goal.

The official leading the overhaul effort, former acting director of the Office of Management and Budget Jeffrey Zients, briefed reporters Friday on the progress that's been made to fix the troubled federal online marketplace. Zients said the error rate for website visitors has dropped from an average of 6% to less than 1% in recent weeks. In addition, the average load time for a page has decreased from eight seconds to less than one second.

“On both of those key metrics—response time and error rates—we've made measurable progress, but we have a lot of work ahead of us,” he said.

Zients also indicated that federal workers and contractors have made more than 200 fixes to the website in recent weeks. But there are 50 additional items on the “punch list” that they'll be focusing on in the next week. Among the issues that continue to plague the site: trouble submitting accurate “834 EDI transmission” notices to insurance companies.

Currently, the site can comfortably handle 20,000 to 25,000 users at one time, Zients said. Federal workers hope to ramp up that capacity this weekend by adding additional servers and database capacity.

“By the end of the month, HealthCare.gov will be working smoothly for the vast majority of users,” Zients reiterated.

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