Tag: Government Accountability Office (GAO)

WASHINGTON - The Government Accountability Office agrees that CMS failed to properly assess “potential organizational conflict” when the agency awarded Maximus the DMEPOS QIC contract. The GAO's decision* comes after C2C Solutions, the current QIC contractor, protested the award. The GAO's decision sustains C2C's protest. “Protest that the agency failed to evaluate a potential impaired objectivity organizational conflict of interest is sustained where the awardee's...

WASHINGTON - The Government Accountability Office isn't pleased with CMS's progress in recovering substantial amounts of improper payments from Medicare Advantage organizations. The agency currently uses risk adjustment data validation audits to recover improper payments in the MA program. The GAO found that CMS's methodology does not result in the selection of contracts for audit that have the greatest potential for recovery of improper payments. The GAO also found “substantial...

WASHINGTON - Performant Recovery has filed a Government Accountability Office (GAO) bid protest against CMS. The protest, filed Jan. 6, comes on the heels of the agency's announcement that it had selected Connolly as the recovery audit contractor (RAC) to oversee the national program for DME, home health and hospice. Wilton, Conn.-based Connolly is the current RAC for Jurisdiction C, while Performant Recovery in Livermore, Calif., is the contractor for Jurisdiction A. The national...

WASHINGTON - The Government Accountability Office (GAO) this week signed off on Medicare's plan to pay RACs for audits of hospitals only if a second-level appeals judge upholds their findings, according to news reports. The change is one of several that CMS plans to put in place as part of signing on a new group of RACs in 2014. “At this point, I do not think that the change will impact how much the RACs get paid, since appeals to the first and second levels are almost always decided...

NEW YORK - The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has denied Rotech's protest that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) unreasonably ignored recent, relevant information when it decided Rotech wasn't financially fit to win contracts to supply veterans with home oxygen equipment, Law360 reports. The VA contended that Rotech, which entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in April, didn't qualify as a “responsible contractor,” according to the story. The VA's contracting officer...