CMS Rolls Back Its Advance and Accelerated Payment Programs

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is lowering the relief payments allocated under both its Advance Payment Program and Accelerated Payment Program. A long-standing pair of measures to help medical institutions during a crisis, CMS greatly expanded both at the end of March in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Effective as of April 26 however, CMS announced, it is no longer accepting new applications for Advance Payments and “reevaluating all pending and new applications” for Accelerated Payments.

CMS cites the substantial federal aid the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) is releasing as a part of the Provider Relief Fund, a combined $175 billion allocated by the CARES Act and subsequent legislation, as the primary reason for rolling back the programs. 

To date, CMS states the payment programs have distributed $100 billion of their own across 21,000 Medicare Part A providers and 24,000 Part B suppliers. But unlike the federal funding, the relief from the Advance and Accelerated Payment Programs are just that: advances. Meant to stimulate cash flow in the short term, most payments must be paid off within a year.

These changes come after the passage of a new round of federal COVID-19 aid funding last week, adding $75 billion to the Provider Relief Fund and injecting $310 billion into the struggling Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Intended to incentivize small businesses to keep on their pre-pandemic workforce, the PPP pays out eight weeks’ worth of a business’s payroll and other expenses, up to $10 million. 

Despite a rough initial relaunch yesterday, and continuing controversy surrounding large companies applying for and receiving the relief funds despite not qualifying, the PPP is again open for new applicants. Find all the details for how to apply on the Small Business Association website.