Matter for Congressional Consideration

1. Status: Closed - Implemented

   Comments: The Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1989 amended the Internal Revenue Code to provide tax penalties on employers who fail to meet secondary payer requirements for the working aged.

   Matter: Congress should consider enacting one of two alternatives. Congress could: (1) statutorily direct the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to promulgate the regulations that it envisioned when it enacted section 4(g) of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA); or (2) amend the Internal Revenue Code to deny employers a deduction for health insurance premiums or impose a tax on such premiums if the policies provided by the employers do not meet the requirements of the Medicare secondary payer provisions for aged beneficiaries.

Recommendations for Executive Action

1. Status: Closed - Implemented

   Comments: HHS increased intermediary savings goals by $340 million for fiscal year 1989 and each intermediary's goal was calculated using that contractor's specific demographic data for beneficiaries served.

   Recommendation: The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), to revise its Contractor Performance Evaluation Program (CPEP) standards to provide the intermediaries with the needed incentives to improve hospital performance in identifying and billing other insurers. To do this, HCFA should increase current savings standards to dollar amounts that intermediaries could not meet without significantly improving hospital performance.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services

2. Status: Closed - Implemented

   Comments: HHS instructed hospitals to ask every beneficiary a set of questions and keep a copy of the beneficiary's responses in the patient's file.

   Recommendation: HCFA should require its intermediaries to direct hospitals that are not taking the steps needed to identify and bill other insurers of Medicare beneficiaries to use a standard admission form designed to detect the availability of insurers that should pay before Medicare. The form should be signed by the Medicare patient and maintained in the hospital billing file.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services: Health Care Financing Administration

3. Status: Closed - Not Implemented

   Comments: The Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1989 prohibits HHS from requiring Medicare contractors to cross-match data to identify secondary payer cases.

   Recommendation: To help ensure that intermediaries exercise diligent efforts at improving hospitals' performance in identifying and billing other insurers, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, HCFA, to require, as a contractual condition, that intermediaries screen Medicare claims against their own insurance policyholders when intermediaries do not meet CPEP secondary payer standards.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services

4. Status: Closed - Implemented

   Comments: Regulations were published on October 11, 1989, effective on November 13, 1989, that expand the definition of no-fault insurance as recommended, and would permit recovery from the insurance company even if it had already paid the beneficiary.

   Recommendation: The Secretary of Health and Human Services should amend regulations implementing provisions of the Social Security Act to: (1) extend MSP provisions of the law to all forms of no-fault insurance coverage; and (2) require that accident insurers notify Medicare of medical payments or other settlements in instances in which it has reason to believe Medicare has an actual or possible right of recovery.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services

5. Status: Closed - Not Implemented

   Comments: The tax penalty provisions of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1989 eliminated the need for EEOC involvement.

   Recommendation: The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, HCFA, to: (1) enter into a memorandum of understanding with EEOC on the type of cases to be referred; and (2) establish procedures for identifying and referring potential violations of provisions of ADEA to EEOC. This can be done, for example, by establishing procedures for monitoring intermediary and regional office case follow-up and referral actions.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services

6. Status: Closed - Implemented

   Comments: CPEP standards were revised and these changes meet the thrust of the recommendation.

   Recommendation: The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Administrator, HCFA, to revise CPEP standards to provide the intermediaries with the needed incentives to improve hospital performance in identifying and billing other insurers. To do this, HCFA should establish new administrative requirements that would direct intermediaries to perform certain oversight and administrative tasks necessary to improve hospital performance in billing Medicare as primary payer.

   Agency Affected: Department of Health and Human Services

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