TRICARE beneficiaries are now just a phone call away from accessing help to resolve creditors' concerns over late or unpaid medical bills.
"These problems tend to occur when physicians are impatient for payment, as they have a right to be. However, the burden of dealing with this system, or any system, should not fall on the individual service member," said Bernard D. Rostker, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness.
This new program formally established debt collection assistance officers as local points of contact that eligible TRICARE beneficiaries may use to resolve medical-bill payment issues.
The new DCAO system, Rostker said, creates a formal method through which beneficiaries can "gain help in dealing with what admittedly is, as is every health-maintenance organization, a bureaucratic process."
The main thing, Rostker said, "is we don't want our people to feel they've been isolated. This is a part of the system and we want to be able to help them if and when this kind of situation occurs."
TRICARE beneficiaries can click a hyperlink button on the system's information website, to identify their local assistance officers, Bonifas said. In a month or two, active-duty service members will see the phone number for their local DCAO on their leave and earnings statements, she added.
In addition, beneficiary counseling and assistance coordinators at all military hospitals and clinics and at TRICARE lead-agent offices can provide assistance for all other TRICARE issues, such as claims, explanation of benefits and enrollment procedures, Bonifas said.
Rostker called the DCAO program a timely response to important service member concerns.
For more information about TRICARE, visit the Military Health System/TRICARE website at www.tricare.osd.mil. -- American Forces Press Service