Being the Squeaky Wheel
How to help stop or change Competitive Bidding
Our article experts unanimously agreed that the No. 1 strategy to defeating Competitive Bidding is staying in constant communication with your legislators. Here what they recommend:
Stay engaged and refuse to be discouraged. “Call your congressional offices regularly. Check in weekly and ask if there are any changes. If a patient has a problem, let your representatives know. If you are going to lay off employees, let your representatives know. Make sure that your congressperson is aware of every development affecting you, your employees and your patients. This kind of persistent effort pays off.”
— John Shirvinsky, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of Medical Suppliers
Provide Congress with proof that Round Two is failing. “Providers and patients should contact Congress about problems with Round Two. Providers can send an e-mail to Congress by visiting action.aahomecare.org. Patients should call People for Quality Care at 1-800-404-8702 to report problems accessing HME. Providers should e-mail stories to AAHomecare at [email protected].”
— Jay Witter IV, vice president of Government Affairs for the American Association for Homecare
Be a trusted resource. “It’s very much like sales. You need to be respected and you can achieve that by being truthful, and providing factual educational information. Remember, you know more about your business and the consumers you serve than do your legislators. Unless they’ve had a personal experience (and some have, you should ask them), they know little of what services you really provide. If you don’t contact them and tell them, the only information resource they have is the government agencies, such as CMS, the GAO and the OIG, which are constantly bombarding Capitol Hill with ‘their version’ of the story. You need to set the record straight.”
— Cara Bachenheimer, senior vice president of Government Relations for Invacare Corp.
This article originally appeared in the September 2013 issue of HME Business.