Question

What changes have the Affordable Healthcare Act brought about for Internal Auditors of NFP and/or Governmental Healthcare Service Providers? Do you think that this has been a positive change? Why/why not?

Items to consider:

Format of Response.

Word count – at least 350 words, and preferably not more than 700 words.

Introduction

Identification of a minimum of 2 issues

Discussion of Issues (with appropriate examples)

Conclusion.

Appropriate use of references.

Originality

Answer 1

The changes brought by Affordable Healthcare Act about Internal auditors of NFP and Governmental  Healthcare Service Providers are:

The internal auditors has to be fallow more the PPACA provisions in order to help their organizations understand the risks associated with the law and their organization’s preparedness to mitigate those risks.

PPACA stands for Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

provisions effective from january 2018 are

All health insurance plans must cover approved preventive care and checkups without co-payment. This ends the previous exemption for "grandfathered" health plans that were in existence prior to the passage of the ACA.

A 40% excise tax on high cost insurance plans is introduced. The tax (as amended by the reconciliation bill) is on insurance premiums in excess of $27,500 (family plans) and $10,200 (individual plans), and it is increased to $30,950 (family) and $11,850 (individual) for retirees and employees in high risk professions. The dollar thresholds are indexed with inflation; employers with higher costs on account of the age or gender demographics of their employees may value their coverage using the age and gender demographics of a national risk pool.

provisions will be effective from january 2019 are

Medicaid extends coverage to former foster care youths who were in foster care for at least six months and are under 25 years old

provisions will be effective from january 2020 are

The Medicare Part D coverage gap (commonly called the "donut hole") will be completely phased out and hence closed.

The "Cadillac Tax" (originally scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2018) goes into effect

In addition, the survey that was conducted showed that:

• Stable or increased resources for internal audit are expected with respect to budgets (90% of organizations) and staffing levels (97%) in 2014.
• Compliance risks are expected to receive greater audit coverage in 2014.
• Internal auditors are misaligned with their organizations’ priorities with respect to strategic business risks. Although 71% of respondents say strategic business risks are a top priority for executive management, 57% indicate no coverage of strategic business risks in their 2014 audit plan.
• An additional 37% said PPACA-associated risks will be somewhat impactful to their organizations. But among respondents who said PPACA would apply to their organization, 38% rated themselves as not very knowledgeable of PPACA, and another 43% said they are just somewhat knowledgeable

This is a positive change