(A) Caseworker errors can be caused by an array of issues, including, training material retention; a lack of adequate funding to balance caseload inventory versus available work hours and staffing levels; a lack of quality review and performance reinforcement; and an assortment of local issues that ...
(A) Caseworker errors can be caused by an array of issues, including, training material retention; a lack of adequate funding to balance caseload inventory versus available work hours and staffing levels; a lack of quality review and performance reinforcement; and an assortment of local issues that lead to employee turnover. The Department will continue to work with eligibility sites regarding caseworker errors identified through this audit. The Department?s caseworker training resources, or Staff Development Center (SDC), is in the process of revamping all of their foundational training materials into a "Process-Based Training" model to be more effective and efficient based on training industry best practice. In addition, the SDC is converting all training materials into several different training modalities (instructor led courses, eLearning courses, desk aids, process manuals, infographics, workbooks, etc.) to be more engaging, effective, and accessible to adult learners with varying needs and preferences across large geographical areas. The revised training model is on track to be completed by July 31, 2021 and fully rolled out to all counties by Fiscal year end 2022. (C) The Department has thoroughly researched the issues identified in this audit and has made changes to CBMS to ensure that it is using the correct income information, income thresholds in determining eligibility, and buy-in premiums are assessed. These issues were fixed May 2019, February 2020, and March 2020, and in June 2021 the income information system issue will be corrected. The Department disagrees with the auditor?s questioned costs and projection of those questions costs. The Department disagrees with the auditor?s sampling, stratification, and costs used to generate the projected questioned costs. The costs incorrectly include members who remain eligible once the identified error had been resolved, payments that will be recovered by the Department through an existing process to recover capitation payments from deceased members, a Social Security Administration (SSA) interface error outside the control of the Department, and costs related to an already identified issue regarding reconciling eligibility between CBMS and Colorado interChange. Some of these costs are related to cases that were ?not eligible? in CBMS but were showing as ?eligible? in Colorado interChange that were already identified by the Department and should have been excluded from the questioned costs and the resulting projections. The Department will resume the reconciliation process between CBMS and Colorado interChange when authorized by CMS. Regarding the SSA interfaces, SSA posted results that are valid conditions for Medicaid eligibility, so those costs should have been excluded from the resulting projections. The Department agrees to bring interface issues to the attention of SSA. The Department has heard that other individuals have been notified on an SSA incarceration status which was incorrect. We have reached out to SSA concerning interface issues and will reach out again. In the meantime we will work with our eligibility workers to attempt to update these cases when they occur.