Medicare - Payment Ceiling Standards - Payment days

Payment ceilings were implemented for clean claims received by the carrier or FI on or after April 1, 1987. “Clean” claims must be paid or denied within the applicable number of days from their receipt date as follows:

Time Period for Claims Received  Applicable Number of Calendar Days

01-01-93 through 09-30-93   24 for EMC and
                             27 for paper claims
10-01-93 and later   30

All claims (i.e., paid claims, partial and complete denials, no payment bills) including PIP and EMC claims are subject to the above requirements.
Interest must be paid on claims that are not paid within the ceiling period.

The count starts on the day after the receipt date and it ends on the date payment is made. For example, for clean claims received October 1, 1993, and later, if this span is 30 days or less, the requirement is met.

The RAPs submitted by home health agencies under the HH PPS (records with type of bill 322 or 332 and dates of service on or after October 1, 2000) are not Medicare claims as defined under the Social Security Act. Since they are not considered claims, they (records with type of bill 322 or 332 and dates of service on or after October 1, 2000) are not subjected to payment ceiling standards and interest payment.

See Chapter 24, § 30.2 for definitions of electronic and paper claims for use in application of the Medicare payment floor. See Chapter 1, § 80.2.1.2 for differentiation between electronic claims that comply with the requirements of the standard implementation guides adopted for national use under HIPAA and those submitted electronically using pre-HIPAA formats supported by Medicare. This HIPAA format differentiation applies to the payment floor, but not to the ceiling