New Medicare Card – Progress Updates

CMS continues to successfully mail newly-designed Medicare cards with the new Medicare number and we are excited to share important progress updates with you. 

As of August 31, we mailed nearly 35 million cards and continue to mail more every day. We are processing claims and eligibility requests with the Medicare Beneficiary Identifier (MBI), showing that providers are successfully using the new number.

We started mailing new cards to people with Medicare who live in Wave 6 states this week and finished mailing cards to people who live in Waves 1, 2, 3 and 4 states. Because card mailing is progressing so well, we updated the mailing schedule to include an approximate start date for the last wave, and we are on track to finish mailing new cards to all people with Medicare before April 2019.

With our ongoing focus on fraud and protecting the identities of people with Medicare, we are continuously adjusting and improving our mailing strategy to make sure we are mailing new cards to accurate addresses and using the highest levels of fraud protection throughout the mailing. To do this, we are:

• Using trusted industry tools and standards to verify addresses
• Comparing each address against multiple information sources to ensure we are mailing to the right person and the right address
• Mailing cards to people with Medicare when we have high confidence in their identity and address

If your Medicare patients say they did not get a card after their mailing wave ends, ask them to:

• Call 1-800-MEDICARE (1-800-633-4227) where we can verify their identity, check their address, and help them get their new card
• Continue to use their current card to get health care services until they get their new card

Your Medicare patients should continue to protect their new number to prevent medical identity theft and health care fraud. We will continue to raise awareness about potential scams and how they can prevent fraud through our outreach and launched a national fraud prevention campaign in September before Medicare Open Enrollment.