If your practice received a direct deposit from the Public Health and Social Services Emergency Fund for provider relief, commonly referred to as the CARES Act HHS Stimulus Relief Fund, you have 30 days from the date of that deposit (most payments were received beginning on April 10) to go online and complete an Attestation confirmation.
On behalf of your practice, the person completing the online form will be confirming receipt of the funds and agreeing to the Terms and Conditions of the payment. If you do not agree with the Terms and Conditions, you will need to make arrangements to return the funds because HHS will deem that your practice has agreed to the Terms and Conditions if you do not respond and your practice keeps the funds.
The important components of the attestation include:
- The Recipient (the healthcare provider, whether an individual or an entity, receiving the Payment) certifies that it billed Medicare in 2019; currently provides diagnoses, testing, or care for individuals with possible or actual cases of COVID-19 (please note that, according to an HFMA Article – “In an update to an HHS page on the CARES Act provider funding, the agency noted, Care does not have to be specific to treating COVID-19. HHS broadly views every patient as a possible case of COVID-19.”); is not currently terminated from participation in Medicare; is not currently excluded from participation in Medicare, Medicaid, and other Federal health care programs; and does not currently have Medicare billing privileges revoked.
The Recipient certifies that the Payment will only be used to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, and shall reimburse the Recipient only for health care related expenses or lost revenues that are attributable to coronavirus.
The Recipient certifies that it will not use the Payment to reimburse expenses or losses that have been reimbursed from other sources or that other sources are obligated to reimburse.
For more information, please see the HMA blog postings related to these payments: (https://www.hmamass.com/blog/new-cares-act-provider-relief-fund-makes-payments-to-physician-practices/ and https://www.hmamass.com/blog/practices-can-qualify-for-cares-funding-even-without-covid-19-patients-hhs-says/). There are embedded links to both the overall description of the program and the actual Terms and Conditions.
If you have any questions regarding whether your practice can comfortably attest, please consult your practice attorney. If you are comfortable, the attestation process is relatively quick and simple if you have the following information:
The group tax ID number
The Relief Fund amount paid to the group
The group bank account number that received the payment (last 6 digits)
The rendering/service address for the group
The billing address for the group
Person completing form name, email address and phone number
If you are an HMA client, your HMA consultant will be sending you an email with all the information above as well as a link to the appropriate page for the Attestation process, but in the meantime, please review the Terms and Conditions so that you will be ready to proceed.
Click here for the link to the Attestation.
Click here for the Terms and Conditions.