MODIFICATION
R -- NATIONAL EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES COST RECOVERY Questions and Answers
- Notice Date
- 6/6/2011
- Notice Type
- Modification/Amendment
- Contracting Office
- WASO - WCP - Denver Contracting & Procurement P.O. Box 25287MS WCP Denver CO 80225
- ZIP Code
- 80225
- Solicitation Number
- P11PS001A93
- Response Due
- 6/10/2011
- Archive Date
- 6/5/2012
- Point of Contact
- Heather N. Madsen Contract Specialist 3039876718 heather_madsen@nps.gov;
- E-Mail Address
-
Point of Contact above, or if none listed, contact the IDEAS EC HELP DESK for assistance
(EC_helpdesk@NBC.GOV)
- Small Business Set-Aside
- Total Small Business
- Description
- Q. Has the NPS EMS billed for these services prior to this RFP?A. Yes Q. If so, who is the current billing contractor?A. Dante Professionals Q. The RFP states that they are 114 programs to be billed for, where are they located?A. These programs are located throughout the NPS Parks Q. What are your rates for ALS1, ALS2, BLSE, ALS and BLS non-transports, and mileage?A. The NPS cannot release this requested information Q. Do you charge for supplies? A. Charge for services Q. If so what are their rates?A. None established. Q. What is the average amount the NPS EMS charge per transport? A. Varies geographically, The NPS cannot release this requested information Q. The RFP states under section 4.1.1 page 36 that completion and submission of Medicare and Medicaid provider enrollment applications as a task. Is it safe to assume that the NPS has never billed the Medicare or Medicaid programs?A. NPS bills CMMS already Q. If not and they have what are your Medicare and Medicaid allowed amounts?A. This information is not available Q. On page 41 Specific Instructions Volume 1 - Price Proposal - subtasks 1.1.2 and 4.1.3 we are ask to propose a fee for Emergency Care-Facility billing. What type of facility will the billing be for?A. Clinic (primary care and emergency care) Q. Is it a facility that is approved and recognized by Medicare?A. Just coming on-line Q. With regard to Volume II - Please clarify - All company reference must be removed even references normally made on in a cover letter. Does this include location of Offeror?A. Any and all types company references and company information must be removed. Q. Also to clarify - all volumes must be in separate binders or bound separately and all electronic copies must be on a separate disk or jump drive.A. Hard copy must be separated and not joined together, binders are not required so as long as the three volumes are not joined together. The soft copy documents can be on one flash drive so as long as they are three separate documents saved onto said drive. Q. As I understand it Line Item Number (LIN) 0001 - Initial Program Establishment is where we would submit our price for the initial program establishment for the general NPS EMS Cost recovery Program. This would be a one-time only fee. Is this correct? A. YES one time for each EMS program Q. LIN 0002 - Program Cost recovery Profile Establishment would be the set-up charge for each individual NPS entity we would contract with. In other words if Park A contracted for services under this IDIQ they would pay this fee for the initial set up of their billing program. When Park B contracted they would pay the same start up fee. Is this correct?A. Yes Q. Billing for subtask 4.1.1 Vendor shall propose for each patient care record processed, a rate of dollars per record this vendor shall charge the NPSEMS. Each proposed pricing shall be broken down via the following categories:A. BLS Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordALS Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordBLS Non-Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordALS Non-Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordEmergency Care - Facility Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of record Q. LIN 0003 - Cost Recovery Billing is where we would quote our price as a rate of dollars per each type of record processed. (listed belowA. BLS Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordALS Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordBLS Non-Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordALS Non-Transport Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of recordEmergency Care - Facility Processing Fee Please propose a fixed fee for processing per this type of record Q. Would NPS EMS consider a billing pricing structure which combined a flat rate for each record processed along with a percentage of funds collected? A. The resulting contract shall be firm fixed price based on the fees charged per record and program establishment for each task order issued under said IDIQ. The NPS will not be considering a mix of fixed fees and percentage of funds collected. Q. Is this a new program and if not, who is the incumbent contractor? A. At this time Dante Professionals is performing EMS Recovery Services for the NPS. Q. The PWS references "EMS programs treat an average of 16,000patients annually through a system of 114 programs." Does NPS EMS provide 16,000 ambulance/patient transport event search year or does the 16,000 reflect all medical events-reimbursableor otherwise? A. NO, NPS Treats 16000 patients a year Q. For example, would a patient provided with simple FirstAid by an unlicensed NPSemployee be counted as one of the 16,000 patients or are there an estimated 16,000 patients provided with reimbursable medical care each year?A. NO, only EMS calls, the 16000 number does not include first aid. Q. Can the National Park Service provide statistics on the following to help define the potential scope of work:A. a.Number of ground ambulances operated. 47b.Number of fixed wing or rotary wing air ambulances operated. Nonec.Number of physicians employed/contracted. 1d.Number of physician assistants or nurse practitioners employed/contracted. 2e.Number of EMT staff employed/contracted. 2000 Q. Under Task 4.1.1. Initial Program Establishment, the key startup activity will be to get NPS EMS ambulance services, facilities and practitioners credentialed and contracted with Medicare,Medicaid and other commercial payers as directed by NPS. Each payer will have their own unique credentialing requirement and the credentialing/contracting process could span many months with each payer with no ultimate guarantee of being included into a payer's network. It is impossible to propose a fixed fee for this task without volume assumptions from NPS on how many ambulance services, facilities and practitioners need to be credentialed and how many insurance programs does NPS desire to attempt to contract with. Could NPS please provide these statistics as assumptions for our fixed fee quotation?A. As this an evolving program in its early stages the NPS does not have this type of information available. Q. Under Task 4.1.2. Program Cost Recovery Profile Establishment:Has NPS contracted with emsCharts to implement a standard interface to support billing such as a HL7 DFT interface?A. emsCharts has a billing export module that is industry standard Q. Are all of the patient records stored in a centralized emsCharts database for all of NPS?A. Yes Q. Will the contractor be provided with online access to emsCharts for coding and claims preparation. A. Yes Q. If not, will NPS provide the contractor with a copy of all documentation for a patient in emsCharts in a PDF or XML document? A. N/A Q. Will the contractor be expected to develop the electronic extract of data from emsCharts or is this being provided by emsCharts or NPS? A. The NPS will give to the contractor access to the billing export module Q. The amount of Coordination of Benefit activity will vary dramatically from patient to patient based on the patient's insurance coverages. It will be difficult to anticipate the amount of payer follow up work required on each patient case-especially if NPS EMS is out-of-network for most payers. Would NPS consider changing the quotation metricfrom "each patient care record processed" to "each claim or bill submitted"? A. NPS will determine which ePCR will be submitted for billing upon closeout of case record. Q.If NPS is willing to change the quotation metric for this task to "each claim or bill submitted",we would recommend asking contractors to propose a per claim or per bill rate based on the following categories: A. No reply, not a question. Q.It does not make sense to propose per "patient care record" prices based on the level and type of care (e.g. "ALS" vs. "BLS") as the coding and billing effort is essentially the same for the contractor for each patient care record. The clinical documentation in emsCharts will drive the level and type of care that the contractor seeks reimbursement for. Asking for pricing based on the type of bill/claim generated may be a better metric and may better reflect differences in the level of effort for the contractor. A. No reply, not a question. Q. Will the contractor be expected to make accounting entries directly into the NPS account receivable (A/R) system as indicated in the PWS "Track/Post all accounting items"? A. NO Q. If so, can the contractor be compensated for the training time required for its staff on the NPS A/R system? A. N/A Q.Does the NPS have existing relationships with collection agencies that the contractor can leverage?A. NO Q. Many states require that a collection agency be licensed by the state. Most collection agencies operate on a contingent percentage of revenues collected. If the contractor is expected to subcontract with a collection agency, it would be difficult to try to predict and blend these costs into a per bill or per patient fixed amount. A. No reply, not a question. Q.Under Task 4.1.4 Payment Structure: Does NPS require that all of the payments be made via check or will each NPS program be able to accept EFT/ACH electronic payments as well? A. NPS Can take credit cards. EFT and ACH is being developed with CMMS. Q.Most payers may not support different addresses for EOB mailings versus check payment mailings. Thus, we're assuming that all EOBs and checks need to be mailed to the contractor first and then the contractor will then mail the checks to each NPS program for deposit. Will the contractor have access to NPS mail and courier accounts? A. NO Q. If not, can the contractor be reimbursed for these costs as an ODC? A. These costs should be built into charges to process Q.Will there be an option to accept credit card payments for patient responsibility amounts which is documented to increase the collection rate and timeliness for small balances and will help reduce the amount of returned check processing required by NPS and the contractor? A. YES
- Web Link
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- Place of Performance
- Address: 1201 Eye Street NWWashington, DC
- Zip Code: 200055905
- Zip Code: 200055905
- Record
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