Florida County Commissioners Vote To Hire New Claims Processing Firm For Indigent Health Plan

Hillsborough County, Fla., commissioners voted on Feb. 6 to hire Miami-based Administrative Services Inc. to process claims for the county's indigent health plan, the St. Petersburg Times reports. The vote comes two days after county officials indicated they no longer felt "comfortable" hiring the company because it had missed a Jan. 25 deadline to submit financial guarantees. However, the same officials on Feb. 6 "urged" the commissioners to hire Administrative Services, saying that the situation with the current claims processor, Ascendia Health Care Management Inc., "required emergency action." Under Ascendia, claims processing was often "mishandled" or slow, which drew complaints from providers, the Times reports. Also, Ascendia recently had told the county it planned to change its software supplier, which county officials said could "knock the [claims processing] system offline" during the transition and effectively end the health plan. Administrative Services will assume control of the claims processing in about 30 days, the Times reports. The switch in processing companies comes as the county's health plan is "struggling" with multimillion-dollar losses (Varian, St. Petersburg Times, 2/7). The health plan covers county residents who do not qualify for other public health programs and have incomes up to 100% of the federal poverty level, or $8,590 for a single person and $17,650 for a family of four. To salvage the plan, which faces a $6.6 million budget deficit this year, the commissioners on Jan. 30 voted to limit enrollment of people with catastrophic illnesses to those with annual incomes at or below 100% of the poverty level, reducing the previous eligibility limit from above 100% of the poverty level (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 1/31).