Federal Reports

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reimburses contractors for a portion of their postretirement benefit (PRB) costs, which are funded by the contributions that contractors make to their dedicated trust fund.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reimburses contractors for a portion of their pension costs, which are funded by the annual contributions that contractors make to their pension plans.

Medicare contractors are required to separately account for the Medicare segment pension plan assets based on the requirements of Cost Accounting Standards (CAS) 412 and 413.The HHS, OIG, Office of Audit Services, Region VII pension audit team reviews the Medicare segment pension assets to ensure compliance with Federal regulations. Previous OIG audits found that Medicare contractors did not always correctly identify and update the segmented pension assets.

Medicare contractors are required to separately account for the Medicare segment pension plan assets based on the requirements of Cost Accounting Standards (CAS) 412 and 413.The HHS, OIG, Office of Audit Services, Region VII pension audit team reviews the Medicare segment pension assets to ensure compliance with Federal regulations. Previous OIG audits found that Medicare contractors did not always correctly identify and update the segmented pension assets.

We investigated whether a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) field inspector accepted bribes from an oil and gas exploration company operating on an Indian reservation in exchange for allowing the company to do business on the reservation. We conducted this investigation jointly with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.Our investigation found no evidence to corroborate the bribery allegations made against the BLM field inspector. Witnesses identified by the complainant did not corroborate the complainant’s statement, and the BLM field inspector denied the allegations.

We investigated allegations that an oil and gas company unlawfully removed oil from a Federal mineral lease, transported the Federal oil to a Wyoming State lease, and concealed both the production and the transfer of the oil from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).We determined that the alleged transfer of oil from the Federal well site was a minimal amount and an isolated occurrence. We closed this investigation and referred the matter to the BLM to address it through its regulatory authority.