Vendor Meetings
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas EDI Services
Vendor Call Minutes
September 15, 2005
CMS is reporting the National Percentage for migration to the HIPPA formats at 99.62%.
General Announcements:
- BCBS of Kansas in efforts to increase first pass pay rates, has begun education on the importance of eligibility editing. EDI Front End eligibility edits will soon be implemented.
- Due to new security issues brought about by CMS, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas is expecting password requirements to change sometime in the near future. 60 days notification should occur. Passwords can be update the next time needed. We highly recommend making your passwords as strong as possible. New passwords will need to be 8 characters long and are require to contain at least one of each of the following:
- Upper Case Characters
- Lower Case Characters
- Numeric Characters
- The hardware issues that occurred the last week in August had nothing to do with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas the Medicare carrier for Kansas, Nebraska and NW Missouri transition to the Medicare B Multi-Carrier System
System Updates:
- On September 17, 2005 the EDI Front End will be down from 10:00 a.m. – Noon. This unscheduled maintenance needs to occur to due to issues that occurred during the week of August 29, 2005 . Notification will occur over today September 15, 2005 and/or tomorrow September 16, 2005 to EDI Clients. This was successfully completed.
- The next EDI System deployment is scheduled for October.
Upcoming Events:
- For those Trading Partners using the PC Ace Pro32 free software an update is scheduled to be released in October.
- Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas EDI Representatives are scheduled to attend the following conventions. You are encourage to contact EDI Marketing at 1-800-472-6481 option number 3 if you have any questions about any convention that is not mentioned.
- September 16 and 17 American College of Physicians – Tan Tara Lake of the Ozarks,
- September 22 and 23 - KMGMA – Topeka
- September 30 and October 1, 2005 - KCA – Kansas City
- October 8 KOA – Wichita KS
- In preparation for the NPI, BCBS of KS Claims Conformation Reports will have an additional field added to them tentatively scheduled to occur with the November 2005 deployment. The additional field will appear right below the provider number and it will contain the 2010AA Billing Provider Primary Identification Number, currently the Employer Idenfication Number (Qualifier 24) or the Social Security Number (Qualifier 34). A generic Claims Confirmation Report will be available in the Public Mailbox of 0000001 by close of business November 7, 2005. Please contact the EDI Help Desk at 1-800-472-6481 for assistance with the Public Mailbox.
MCS Transition:
- Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas the Medicare B Carrier for Kansas, Nebraska and NW Missouri Claims mandated move to the Multi-Carrier System for Medicare B claims adjudication was successfully completed on September 6, 2005. As anticipated some sporadic issues have been reported and are as follows:
- Some Chiropractic Claims had been returned to providers with a MA121 remarks code which indicates missing/invalid/incomplete x-ray date. Medicare does not require this information to be submitted any longer however when providers contact Medicare the system indicates missing/invalid/incomplete initial treatment date (Qualifier 454).
- 09/15/2005 The issues was resolved and claims were automatically reprocessed for correction. Please note of claims originally submitted with out the 454 qualifier and the initial treatment date claims will be rejected appropriately on the remittance advice. Medicare is currently working on a resolution chiropractic submitters need to verify they are submitting the 454 and initial treatment date .
- MCS 835 4010A1 transactions can be received with multiple payers of 00650,00655 and 00740 in one file. Previously VMS would split out and create 835 4010A1 transactions by payer ID numbers.
- 835 Companion documents were updated and posted to the web sites as of close of business 09/15/2005.
- Untimely delivery of the Medicare B 835 remittance advices has been experienced. This issue was corrected 09/14/2005. If you or your clients are experiencing any delivery issue as of 09/15/2005 in the receipt of remittance advices please contact the EMS Help Desk as soon as possible at 1-800-472-6481 select option number 1.
- Some delivery issues have been identified with the MCS EDI Edit reports, these reports have the IXE extension. The issue was resolved as of close of business 09/15/2005. If you or your clients still experiencing any after 09/15/2005 please contact the EMS Help Desk as soon as possible at 1-800-472-6481 selecting option number 1.
- The most current information is posted at the Medicare Web address under MCS Transition.
835 Information:
- With the successful transition to MCS completed on September 6, 2005, BCBS of KS remittance advices will have include with them Plan 65. This was previously separated.
Telecommunications Changes:
- ASK will be discontinuing the dial-up connections for file transfer. Vendors should encourage their sites to move to IVANS, VisionShare, or using the ASK Website. This does not affect calls to Customer Service, the Help Desk, connectionthrough the Internet, vendors, or clearinghouses. FTP Dial-up has not yet been scheduled for this change.
- Toll-Free dial-up access for file transfer will be discontinued on September 1, 2005. Trading Partners still using the dial-up option after September 1 will need to change the phone number to 785-291-0278.
- All additional dial-up access for file transfer is tentatively scheduled for disconnection in April 2006.
270/271 Issues:
- Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas is ready for production.
- BCBSKS is currently testing 270/271 Real Time over the Internet.
- Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City is ready for production however they need to have a separate ST-SE transaction set header for each request.
276/277 Issues:
- Medicare A has reported an issue to FISS. FISS is currently working on a fix however does not have a date the fix will be implemented.
- With the MCS Transition complete Medicare B is currently accepting beta test sites.
- Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas. Currently on production.
- Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City is ready for production however they need to have a separate ST-SE transaction set header for each request
Provider Communications
- The 4 th quarter Just ASK newsletter is tentatively schedule to be mailed early October.
- In 2006 the Just ASK newsletter will no longer be mass mailed. The Just ASK newsletter will be posted to the ASK web site, www.ask-edi.com ASK will work with providers whom do not have access to the internet.
- Updates continue to be posted to the Medicare web sites concerning MCS Transition.
- Tentatively scheduled in two weeks a Medicare MCS Newsletter will be published. This will be posted to the web and also mailed to all Medicare B Providers.
The next regularly scheduled conference call is 10/20/2005.
Phone Number: 1-877-326-2337 – Pass code 2102557
- Back -