Administrative Relief and Accurate Medicare Payments Acto of 2013

 Congressman Adrian Smith (R-NE) introduced H.R. 2329, the Administrative Relief and Accurate Medicare Payments Act of 2013 with 12 original cosponsors.
“While strong oversight of Medicare payments is essential to prevent waste and fraud, the current process is overly-burdensome and time consuming,” said Smith.  “Today, I introduced the Administrative Relief and Accurate Medicare Payments Act as a first step to reduce the red tape for providers while ensuring payments are accurate.  This commonsense solution would allow hospitals and doctors to focus more resources providing quality care for their patients, and spend less time dealing with the Medicare bureaucracy.”
Background:
Recovery Audit Contractors (RACs) were created through the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003 to identify and recover improper payments to healthcare providers under fee-for-service Medicare plans.  While RACs have successfully recovered millions in improper payments, they have also strained hospitals and providers with increased administrative burdens and narrow filing periods.
In order to address these concerns while continuing to improve payment accuracy, the Administrative Relief and Accurate Medicare Payments Act of 2013 would ease some of the requirements, increase the filing period for claims, and make other changes to streamline the appeals process.  It is important hospitals and other health care providers are appropriately compensated so they continue to make high quality care available to all patients.