Report 2016-128 Recommendation 8 Responses

Report 2016-128: In‑Home Supportive Services: The State Could Do More to Help Providers Avoid Future Payment Delays (Release Date: March 2017)

Recommendation #8 To: Social Services, Department of

To ensure that OSI is adequately monitoring HPE and to allow for more proactive management of the IHSS program, Social Services should work with OSI to enforce the contract provision requiring HPE to submit monthly data on the number of timesheets with exceptions by county and the time taken to resolve those exceptions. Moreover, Social Services should develop a process for regularly reviewing these data to detect any discrepancies among the counties' processes for handling timesheets with exceptions.

1-Year Agency Response

CDSS receives and reviews the CMIPS data download file from the vendor, which provides a greater level of detail than the MOMR, that the CDSS APD auditor uses in conjunction with the CMIPS II system to drill down on cases to determine the reason(s) for any exceptions and the time it took to resolve the exceptions by county. The CDSS APD auditor identifies any counties out of compliance based on the aging of their timesheet exceptions and reports any findings to CDSS management (Attachment D). CDSS management then communicates with counties to ensure that the exceptions are being processed following CDSS policies and procedures as outlined in ACL 17-48. See Attachment B for the procedures used.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 1-Year Status: Fully Implemented

6-Month Agency Response

CDSS now receives and reviews the Hewlett-Packard Enterprises (HPE) Monthly Organizational Management Report (MOMR); HPE refined the report as of January 2017 to include the number of timesheets with exceptions by county and the time taken to resolve those exceptions by county. CDSS has implemented a process for an Associate Management Auditor to review the MOMR and identify any counties out of compliance based on the aging of their timesheet exceptions. Please see attached process flow for more details (see Attachments A and B).

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: Partially Implemented

Although Social Services now has access to monthly data on the number of timesheets with exceptions by county and the time taken to resolve those exceptions, we are still awaiting actual examples from Social Services demonstrating that its staff is regularly reviewing these data to detect discrepancies.

60-Day Agency Response

CDSS now receives and reviews the HPE Monthly Organizational Management Report (MOMR), HPE refined the report as of January 2017 to include the number of timesheets with exceptions by county and the time taken to resolve those exceptions by county.

As mentioned in the previous response, CDSS has also submitted change requests to CMIPS II vendor to modify data download files, to ensure that the Department and counties can better track the processing of timesheet exceptions.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: Partially Implemented

Using the MOMR, Social Services now has access to monthly data on the number of timesheets with exceptions by county and the time taken to resolve those exceptions. However, our recommendation also addresses the need for developing a process for its review to detect discrepancies among the counties' processes for handling timesheets with exceptions. In addition, although Social Services communicated that it has submitted change requests to HPE to modify data download files, it did not indicate whether it has received or reviewed these data.

All Recommendations in 2016-128

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.