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Medicare patients overpaid due to computer glitch
Computer Audit Update
computer system that manages telecommunications between exchanges, and prevented local and international connections for up to six hours. The disruptions came at a particularly embarrassing time for Singapore as several multinational companies' executives and heads of state were in the country for a conference on economic relations between Europe and Asia. The usually efficient Singapore was promoting itself as an Asian business-information and financial centre at the conference organized by the Singapore Economic Development Board and the World Economic Forum of Switzerland. Futures traders commented that the outage severely disrupted its global business at peak trading time, but other financial markets were largely unaffected.
Collision prevention software developed The South Korean Air Force have developed some software that helps prevent mid-air collisions of aircraft reports Korea Newsreview. The Air-track Density Analysis Set (ADAS) software uses radar information to display three-dimensional aircraft tracks across the South Korean airways and detects potential collisions and their impact times. The software is currently being used in the Master Control Reporting Centre at Osan Air Base.
Toy shop's $1 million order lost in Playtex's billing system A $1 sent from Products Investor's
million purchase order electronically a toy retailer in the US to Playtex Inc. was lost temporarily reports Business Daily.
The order sent to Playtex's billing system from Toys"R"Us was not taken from an electronic mailbox and electronically placed in the billing system due to a software fault. This led to a $1 million timing switch in which Playtex ended up
18
November 1994
sending the order a week later, and as this occurred at the break point of a quarter, the order got carried into the next quarter rather than being posted in the quarter it would have counted in. When T o y s " R " U s eventually called wondering where their order had got to, Playtex were alerted to the problem. Playtex's systems department immediately identified the error as lying in their own in-house software, which acts as a go-between from the order capture application to the billing system. To prevent similar mistakes happening in the future Playtex has added an extra checking function to its billing system.
Medicare patients overpaid due to computer glitch A 'glitch' in a computer system has led to overpayment of about $70 million on health care plans covering Medicare patients according to The Washington Post. The federal government overpaid health plans over the past four years and intends to retrieve the loss by withholding money from future payments. The mistake occurred because of a fault in the computer system that tracks the eligibility of patients for Medicaid, a state-federal assistance for the poor and disabled added on top of Medicare benefit. Since 1990, the system failed to alert the Medicare computer system when patients lost their eligibility for the additional Medicaid benefit. As a result, patients that were no longer eligible received overpayments that averaged $250 per person. The error was discovered by the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services and by department officials in Texas through an audit. Gale Drapala, deputy director of the Health Care Financing Administration's Office of Managed Care claimed that the $70 million overpayment was "not a huge amount of money" compared with the $900 million paid out by Medicare monthly to health maintenance organizations.
©1994 Elsevier Science Ltd
computer system that manages telecommunications between exchanges, and prevented local and international connections for up to six hours. The disruptions came at a particularly embarrassing time for Singapore as several multinational companies' executives and heads of state were in the country for a conference on economic relations between Europe and Asia. The usually efficient Singapore was promoting itself as an Asian business-information and financial centre at the conference organized by the Singapore Economic Development Board and the World Economic Forum of Switzerland. Futures traders commented that the outage severely disrupted its global business at peak trading time, but other financial markets were largely unaffected.
Collision prevention software developed The South Korean Air Force have developed some software that helps prevent mid-air collisions of aircraft reports Korea Newsreview. The Air-track Density Analysis Set (ADAS) software uses radar information to display three-dimensional aircraft tracks across the South Korean airways and detects potential collisions and their impact times. The software is currently being used in the Master Control Reporting Centre at Osan Air Base.
Toy shop's $1 million order lost in Playtex's billing system A $1 sent from Products Investor's
million purchase order electronically a toy retailer in the US to Playtex Inc. was lost temporarily reports Business Daily.
The order sent to Playtex's billing system from Toys"R"Us was not taken from an electronic mailbox and electronically placed in the billing system due to a software fault. This led to a $1 million timing switch in which Playtex ended up
18
November 1994
sending the order a week later, and as this occurred at the break point of a quarter, the order got carried into the next quarter rather than being posted in the quarter it would have counted in. When T o y s " R " U s eventually called wondering where their order had got to, Playtex were alerted to the problem. Playtex's systems department immediately identified the error as lying in their own in-house software, which acts as a go-between from the order capture application to the billing system. To prevent similar mistakes happening in the future Playtex has added an extra checking function to its billing system.
Medicare patients overpaid due to computer glitch A 'glitch' in a computer system has led to overpayment of about $70 million on health care plans covering Medicare patients according to The Washington Post. The federal government overpaid health plans over the past four years and intends to retrieve the loss by withholding money from future payments. The mistake occurred because of a fault in the computer system that tracks the eligibility of patients for Medicaid, a state-federal assistance for the poor and disabled added on top of Medicare benefit. Since 1990, the system failed to alert the Medicare computer system when patients lost their eligibility for the additional Medicaid benefit. As a result, patients that were no longer eligible received overpayments that averaged $250 per person. The error was discovered by the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services and by department officials in Texas through an audit. Gale Drapala, deputy director of the Health Care Financing Administration's Office of Managed Care claimed that the $70 million overpayment was "not a huge amount of money" compared with the $900 million paid out by Medicare monthly to health maintenance organizations.
©1994 Elsevier Science Ltd