HHS Enlists Senior Citizens As Medicare Fraud Busters

WASHINGTON--The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced a new program to reward citizens who alert Medicare to acts of fraud and abuse. The Incentive Program for Fraud and Abuse Information, starting in January 1999, will pay 10% of a recovered overpayment up to a maximum of $1,000.

Among the things Medicare hopes beneficiaries will report are: being billed for services they never received; double billing for the same procedure; being billed for a more expensive procedure than that provided; receiving a bill for a medically unnecessary procedure; providers who use Medicare numbers that they obtained through deception; and telemarketing scams.