HEALTHCARE/VA/VETS: “A system set up by the Department of Veterans Affairs in 2014 to pay private-sector health-care providers was plagued by delays and overpayments, hampering the multibillion-dollar effort to reduce appointment wait times, a federal watchdog office said Thursday [12-21-17].
Over a two-year period through 2016, the VA made approximately 224,000 payment errors resulting in $39 million in overpayments, according to a report by the VA’s inspector general, which also said half of the payments were late. The system failed to comply with federal regulations and lacked controls to make timely payments, main causes of its systemic problems.
The payment system was put into place in 2014 in the wake of a wait-time scandal that led to emergency congressional action to pump $10 billion into the department specifically to fund private-sector appointments. Congress gave the VA 90 days to establish the system, a timeline the department and experts have said was rushed…
The VA already has addressed a number of issues highlighted in the report, officials said.”
-Ben Kesling, “VA Overpaid for Private-Sector Services, Report Finds,” The Wall Street Journal online, Dec. 21, 2017 04:51pm