By Asmau Ahmad
The National Health Insurance Agency (NHIA) has vowed to tackle late payment of tariffs to HealthCare Facilities due to them from Health Maintenance Organisations.
The coordinator of the agency in Nasarawa State, Mrs. Mary Aliu, disclosed this on the sidelines of a one-day stakeholders forum held in the state on Thursday.
The NHIA and HMOs are expected to pay healthcare facilities (HCFs) tariffs monthly to provide healthcare services to enrolees.
During the Question-and-Answer segment of the forum, some of the representatives of the HCFs or healthcare providers decried the late or non-payment of tariffs owed them by HMOs.
Reacting to that development, Aliu said the late payment of tariffs to HCFs was becoming a concern for the NHIA.
According to her, this is why the agency resolved to find a lasting solution to the situation to enable HCFs to get their payments on time for prompt service provided to enrolees.
“We are doing all we can because we take the matter seriously. Our enforcement department is doing much concerning that.
“Right now, we just finished the reconciliation exercise and we have been able to see those HMOs that are owing and letters have been issued and so on.
“Just to make sure that all the healthcare providers that are complaining are sorted out as soon as possible,” she said.
She affirmed that some HMOs deliberately give one reason or the other so as not to pay on time their part of the tariffs for the insurance of enrolees.
Mrs Aliu added that the agency has been up and doing by calling and speaking to them to pay their part of the tariffs to the HCFs so as not to affect the provision of healthcare services to enrolees.
Aliu said the stakeholders’ forum was aimed at enlightening the public, especially those in Nasarawa West Senatorial Zone, on the importance of health insurance and the efforts put in place by the federal government to make health insurance accessible to all Nigerians.
Aliu lauded President Muhammadu Buhari for signing into the law the new NHIA Act 2022.
According to her, the new law is an upgrade to the former Act with provisions for sanctions for Health Maintenance Organisations (HMOs) and also enrolees that are not doing the right thing.
She explained that the essence of the stakeholder’s forum was to bring together all stakeholders to brainstorm and engage with them to find out if NHIA is going in the right direction, what complaints and where corrections are needed.
