Medicare Recovery Audit Contracting

Book excerpt: The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) conducted a three-year project to demonstrate the use of recovery audit contractors (RAC) in identifying Medicare improper payments and recouping overpayments. This report examined issues that arose during the demonstration project and CMS¿s efforts to address them in the national RAC program. It examines the extent to which CMS: (1) developed a process and took corrective actions to address vulnerabilities identified by the RACs that led to improper payments; (2) resolved coordination issues between the RACs and the Medicare claims admin. contractors; and (3) established methods to oversee RAC claim review accuracy and provider service during the national program. Charts and tables.