The Obama administration has deferred for a year putting into place a provision of the Affordable Care Act that limits an individual’s annual out-of-pocket expenditures to $6350.

Some patients will have to pay up to $6350 for physician and hospital services, plus another $6350 for prescription drugs — and possibly more, according to the New York Times.

Why the delay? The Times explains that separate computer billing systems for drugs and services within some organizations cannot communicate. One unnamed administration source told the newspaper: “We had to balance the interests of consumers with the concerns of health plan sponsors and carriers, which told us that their computer systems were not set up to aggregate all of a person’s out-of-pocket costs. They asked for more time to comply.”

In addition, last month the administration announced a delay in the requirement that large employers offer health insurance to full-time employees.

Source: New York Times