Being an old guy (72) i am on Medicare. At the beginning of the pandemic they passed a regulation where Medicare will pay for free Covid tests for any Medicare beneficiary who requests one. No cost to me, but Medicare picks up the tab 100%. So I figured it would be a good to have a test or two on hand in case I got any symptoms. So I made the request at the beginning of the pandemic. Glad I did since I came down with symptoms 5 or 6 months ago. Tested positive. I made a full recovery after a few days with some medication and rest. No big deal. Fever for a few days, that's it.

Well the company that filled the contract keeps sending me test kits, despite repeated requests to stop. I have about 25 test kits so far. Of course they bill Medicare each time. I got another package of test kits today. I have already asked them to stop several times.

First I blame the company for doing this rip off. But I won't let Medicare completely off the hook. The billing is electronic, so no human is involved. But there should be a computer program to flag repeated monthly billings like this for review. Tomorrow I will contact the Medicare Office of the Inspector General (OIG) and ask them to look into this.

While I appreciate your desire to see tax dollars going to things of use, you are unlikely to hear back from the OIG.

My sister discovered providers billing and collecting payments related to Father's long-term care. In the end she discovered a couple of hundred thousand dollars in double billed/double paid invoices. Reported it. Nothing happened.

quote:

Originally posted by Sig2340:
While I appreciate your desire to see tax dollars going to things of use, you are unlikely to hear back from the OIG.

My sister discovered providers billing and collecting payments related to Father's long-term care. In the end she discovered a couple of hundred thousand dollars in double billed/double paid invoices. Reported it.
Nothing happened.

OIG is prohibited by law to reveal the results of any investigations, even to the reporter of the fraud. It's quite possible that you may be correct that nothing was done. But if you made an inquiry as to the status of the investigation, they would not have responded.

I reported similar problems when the Waynesboro First Aid Crew billed bogus charges and then collected from my fathers DuPont Insurance and Medicare resulting in them collecting about 160 percent of the initial bill.

When I reported it to Medicare, they said I did not have authority.

If its a major amount of money, after an interval of a few months I would consider contacting my congressman. Don't ask them for the results of the investigation. Just ask for confirmation that Medicare OIG got the report and they are looking into it.

Congressmen spend so much time on bullshit. Oversight is or should be one of their most important responsibilities. If you see evidence of Medicare fraud, make sure you report it to the right place. Don't call Social Security. They have no jurisdiction. Report it here.
https://oig.hhs.gov/fraud/report-fraud/

HHS-OIG is so far underwater with CARES Act and related "pandemic" work that they can't even see the surface. Complicating this is that the hotline is likely (though not positive about this) staffed up by contractors, not investigators, who do a preliminary vetting of the complaint and might send it to a variety of possible places for follow-up (administrative action by the CMS, further review, send it to OI, burn it so the Commies don't get it, whatever.) Only one of those possible places is the relevant Investigations office.

One-off or sporadic double-billing is hard to turn into a criminal case, believe it or not, because a fairly standard reply is "Oh, that's a clerical error. We'll reverse the overpayment back to CMS immediately." Actual intent to defraud-- to a criminal standard-- might be difficult to prove up. But it's GREAT fodder for civil action under the False Claims Act because actual knowledge isn't necessary to sustain an FCA action. Reckless disregard for the truth or falsity of the claim is sufficient. That's a fairly common outcome for those; nobody gets locked up, they just get made poorer.

I am a retired OIG guy, though not HHS, and I'm comfortable saying that every office is understaffed and underfunded. It's as if somebody didn't actually WANT meaningful oversight, or something...

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reported similar problems when the Waynesboro First Aid Crew billed bogus charges and then collected from my fathers DuPont Insurance and Medicare resulting in them collecting about 160 percent of the initial bill.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Which insurance is primary? Makes a big difference in allowable charges.

I have the opposite problem. When I order tests from this link https://special.usps.com/testkits I get this reply:

This address has reached the current limit for test orders.

Our records show that the address you entered has already requested the maximum number of free at-home tests allowed. Under this program, addresses are eligible for one order of #4 free tests if your last order was before December 15, 2022. If you need more tests, please visit the COVID.gov "Other Testing Resources" section.

About 6 or 8 weeks ago, we got 8 test kits delivered by FedEx. We never requested them, they just showed up.

Mrs. Vinnybass got four a few days ago.

Never requested them.

"The company that filled that contract..." Did the company called you the first time to get your info? I got my tests directly from the government at the time and I wasn't on Medicare. Then sometime in the last year at least, I keep getting calls from "companies" wanting to make sure I get my free covid tests if I have Medicare. Yeah, fuck that.

Medicare is a giant government through for parasites to get their fill. Somehow, my dad got a bed to use when he came home from the hospital. When we put him in a home, I called the company to take it back but they refused. Okay. But years later, right after my dad died never having returned home, the company called to say they will pick up the bed. That's when the light clicked on for me. The bed was in the garage all the time and the company was getting rent money for the bed that got paid many times over for its value.

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after my dad died never having returned home, the company called to say they will pick up the bed.

"I asked you to pick it up years ago. You did not want it, so we disposed of it."