New Medicare Card – Progress Updates

New Medicare Card – Progress Updates

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) continues to successfully mail newly-designed Medicare cards with the new Medicare Number and we’re excited to share important progress updates with you. 

As of August 31, we’ve mailed nearly 35 million cards and continue to mail more every day.   We’re 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’re 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’re continuously adjusting and improving our mailing strategy to make sure we’re mailing new cards to accurate addresses and using the highest levels of fraud protection throughout the mailing.  To do this, we’re:

Using trusted industry tools and standards to verify addresses.

• Comparing each address against multiple information sources to ensure we’re 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 someone with Medicare says they didn’t get a card after their mailing wave ends, you should instruct 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.

People with Medicare should continue to protect their new number to prevent medical identity theft and healthcare fraud.  We’ll 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.