When: Tuesday, February 7, 2017 at 11:00 a.m. PT/ 2:00 p.m. ET.
Improper billing occurs when hospitals, doctors, or other providers charge beneficiaries who have both Medicaid and Medicare (dual eligibles) for co-pays, co-insurance, and deductibles. Qualified Medicare Beneficiaries, including most dual eligibles, should never be charged for services covered under Medicaid or Medicare. This illegal practice stretches already thin budgets and often leads to disruptions in health care and fear of aggressive collection efforts.
This webinar, Improper Billing of Dual Eligibles—an Update, focused on new developments and tools to help advocates combat the persistent problem of improper billing of dual eligibles and Qualified Medicare Beneficiaries (QMBs). Federal law protects low income Medicare beneficiaries from paying co-insurance and co-pays, but ensuring that those protections work has been a challenge for advocates. Help is at hand.
This webinar reviewed these protections and discussed:
- NEW procedures implemented by CMS for reporting improper billing and for enforcement
- Best practices for ensuring that billing protections are understood by providers and beneficiaries
- NEW tools that advocates can use to assist beneficiaries in resolving improper billing. They include a just-released consumer advisory from the Consumer Financial Protection Board and the Medicare-Medicaid Coordination Office. The two-page flyer gives consumers simple instructions on what to do when they are wrongfully billed for Medicare charges.
Presenters:
Kim Glaun, Federal Coordinated Health Care Office (MMCO)
Denny Chan, Staff Attorney, Justice in Aging
Beverly Yang, Office of Older Americans, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Get the consumer advisory here.
The webinar took place on Tuesday, February 7 at 11:00 a.m. PT/ 2:00 p.m. ET.
