Home Health & Hospice Week

Blanket extension means it’s automatic.

Medicare has pushed cost report deadlines once again.

The same: The deadline for cost report years ending Oct. 31 and Nov. 30 already passed on June 30, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and its HHH Medicare Administrative Contractors aren’t extending those any further, say MACs Palmetto GBA, National Government Services, and CGS on their websites.

Different: The deadline for cost report years ending Dec. 31 was originally extended to July 31, Palmetto notes. But now the MACs are pushing it another month to Aug. 31, they say.

New: The MACs also have pushed cost reports for years ending Jan. 31 to an Aug. 31 deadline, and for years ending Feb. 28 to a Sept. 30 deadline. The latter were originally due July 31.

“This extension applies to all provider types and does not require a request or notification to the Medicare Adminis­trative Contractor,” NGS clarifies on its site.

“This is a blanket extension and providers do not need to request for extensions,” CGS agrees.

“Cost report reminder letters that were sent out previously will not be re-issued,” NGS adds.

“We encourage electronic filing of cost report via the Medicare Cost Report e-Filing System (MCReF),” NGS says. (For more on MCRef, see Eli’s HCW, Vol. XXVII, No. 35).

But remember: You don’t have to wait until the last minute to file — especially with a potential COVID-19 surge in the offing. “We encourage all affected providers to submit their cost reports as soon as all data is available,” says consulting firm The Health Group in Morgantown, West Virginia, in its electronic newsletter.