MACs to offer online access to new Medicare beneficiary identifiers

Starting next June, health care providers will be able to use their Medicare Administrative Contractor’s secure portal to look up their patients’ new Medicare Beneficiary Identifiers, according to a new Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services factsheet. The factsheet was recently mailed to all Medicare fee-for-service providers with a letter about the MBI, which will replace the Health Insurance Claim Number on transactions such as billing, eligibility status and claim status by April 2019. The agency expects a transition period to begin no earlier than April 1, 2018 and run through Dec. 31, 2019, during which providers can use either the HICN or the MBI to exchange data with CMS. The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 requires CMS to remove Social Security Numbers from all Medicare cards by April 2019. The HICN is SSN-based.