CMS Asks for Details about Competitive Bidding Problems

ARLINGTON, Va.--On Friday, the American Association for Homecare held a conference call with officials at CMS and several other national provider associations regarding problems with the agency's competitive bidding system.
According to a statement from the association issued late Saturday, "AAHomecare initiated the call due to the overwhelming concerns expressed by its member companies about technical issues related to submitting bids through the online system and also the issue of the consistency of instructions and information available to providers during the course of the bidding process."
During the call, the association said CMS agreed to review the issues on another call to take place Wednesday, July 25.
To better inform CMS and AAHomecare for that discussion, the association is asking for feedback from first-round bidders who 1) are still having problems submitting a bid or 2) have questions about whether their bids were based on consistent information from CMS. The second point is related to companies "that submitted a bid but after the fact received updated guidance or other information that might have influenced the bid had it been known earlier," the association said.
AAHomecare said Herb Kuhn, acting deputy administrator of CMS, acknowledged the problems with the bid system during the call and cited them as the reason for the extension in the bidding deadline (to July 27) that was announced on Thursday.
"CMS officials said they want to be responsive to providers' bidding problems but need to understand the nature and the magnitude of the problems," the association said. "Therefore, provider feedback is important."
AAHomecare asked that comments be sent directly to the Competitive Bidding Implementation Contractor at cbic.admin@palmettogba.com and also copied to AAHomecare at staceyh@aahomecare.org.