Auditors object to lack of records to justify health exchange payments

Legislative auditors say the Silver State Health Insurance Exchange doesn’t have controls in place to ensure it’s only paying contractors for services actually rendered.

They told the Audit Subcommittee there was only documentation to support 3,000 of the 17,900 staff hours paid over a six-month period to the navigators who provide uninsured people information they need to enroll in health insurance mandated by the Affordable Care Act.

The nine navigator entities in the program received a total of $368,000 between May and October last year to provide outreach, education and enrollment assistance to people.

Auditors also questioned some of the events navigators reported attending. They pointed out one entity reported attending an international lingerie convention, a belly dance festival and a cocktail party fundraiser sponsored by another navigator company.

In addition, there were questions about the marketing contractor hired by the exchange who collected $225,000 for education and outreach services actually performed by a subcontractor.

They complained throughout the documentation to justify payments by the exchange just wasn’t there.

One example they cited is the subcontractor staff worked two months to prepare a list of outreach activities for the exchange board but then attended only nine of the 64 events on the list.

Subcommittee chairman Sen. Ben Kieckhefer, R-Reno, said spending the amounts of money the exchange is spending without appropriate oversight is troubling because there’s no way to determine whether the work product is meeting needs.

“What controls are in those navigator contracts to ensure those services were rendered,” he asked. “To ensure the work being paid for was done.”

Exchange Director Bruce Gilbert said he and his staff have already begun implementing audit recommendations and is now requiring “hundreds of pages of documentation” to justify payments.

Chief Operating Officer Heather Korbulic said they are now collecting all the data needed to determine who should be paid and how much.