Home Health & Hospice Week

Time both data collection and report filing to be as beneficial as they can.

Between the holiday rush and the quickly changing enforcement landscape for vaccination requirements, don’t lose sight of the benefits of starting your hospice cap reporting process as soon as possible.

Why? If you suspect you’ll be anywhere near exceeding your per beneficiary cap, downloading your Provider Statistical & Reimbursement (PS&R) data early will “minimize any liability which may be due with the self-filing,” consulting and accounting firm The Health Group in Morgantown, West Virginia, says in its electronic newsletter. Go ahead and schedule it for the first week of January, the firm recommends. The cap reporting deadline is Feb. 28.

That means you need to make sure you are able to download the data. “Providers are required to obtain the PS&R net reimbursement amount and beneficiary counts information directly through the Enterprise Identity Management (EIDM) system,” notes Morgan Crews with BKD in Springfield, Missouri. “If your agency needs to establish EIDM and PS&R access, be sure to register now,” Crews stresses in online analysis.

If you already have an EIDM account and PS&R access, double-check to make sure it’s active, The Health Group advises. You may need to update your password, for example.

All three HHH Medicare Administrative Contractors accept cap reports via email now, Crews notes. Check their cap webpages for details at www.cgsmedicare.com/hhh/audit/hos_caps.html; www.palmettogba.com/palmetto/jmhhh.nsf/DID/BK5R4Z8172; and www.ngsmedicare.com/web/ngs/search-details?selectedArticleId=1037138 (National Government Services doesn’t appear to have posted an updated page for the 2021 cap year yet, but the email address for reporting the cap will presumably be the same).

Two more cap reporting tips from The Health Group include:

• If the cap report, prepared in January, reflects a liability, don’t file until the end of February for cash-flow purposes, and
• If you expect, or have a cap liability, determine how the liability is to be repaid. If you plan on requesting an Extended Repayment Schedule, get your accounting records closed and financial statements prepared early to support the request for ERS.