Jacksonville Health Care Law Attorneys Rick M. Reznicsek and Elizabeth ‘Liz’ Shaw report on an article from the Office of Inspector General. On February 8, 2012, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) issued an Alert to physicians to exercise caution when reassigning their Medicare payments. The OIG reported that physicians who reassign their rights to bill Medicare and receive Medicare payments by executing the CMS-855R application may be liable for false claims submitted by entities to which they reassigned their benefits. When the legal service payment is made to an entity under a contractual arrangement, both the supplier of the professional services and the billing entity are jointly and severally responsible for any Medicare overpayment to that entity. Physicians should perform their due diligence on entities to which they choose to reassign their Medicare payments and ensure that the entities are legitimate providers or suppliers of health care items and services.
Click Here for a copy of to the full text of the OIG Alert.
