Medicare Claims: HCFA (Health Care Financing Administration) Proposal to Establish an Administrative Law Judge Unit.
Abstract
This report briefed certain of your offices on our work relative to the requirement in section 4037 of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 to study the Health Care Financing Administration's (HCFA) proposal to establish, at a cost of about $15 million, its own hearings and appeals unit to handle Medicare cases. A special feature of this proposal was HCFA's projection that administrative law judges (ALJs) located in this unit would handle 50 percent of the appeals over the telephone. HCFA's proposal was presented to the Congress for funding in the fall of 1987; the proposal was not approved primarily because of congressional concerns about conducting the hearings by telephone rather than face-to-face. We reviewed HCFA's documentation for its proposal and met with Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials responsible for developing the proposal and Office of Personnel Management officials responsible for approving and monitoring ALJs in federal agencies. We also discussed the proposal with health service provider associations, national associations representing the elderly, and Medicare claims processing contractors who currently use telephone hearings.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 1988
- Accession Number
- ADA192363
Entities
Organizations
- United States Government Accountability Office