CAA Mandate – CareFirst Updates Provider Portal
Changes coming to Provider Portal
In the October and December 2021, and February 2022 issues of BlueLink, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield and CareFirst BlueChoice, Inc. (collectively “CareFirst”) notified you of the Consolidated Appropriations Act (CAA), which included a summary of changes for the provider directory. As part of this mandate, providers are required to attest/update their directory information every 90 days. To support this process, CareFirst has developed a self-service tool, as well as training user guides.
Benefits of Updating Your Information
Updating your data is important to doing business with CareFirst. Our members (your patients) rely on the information we have about you and your practice in our directories. They use these resources to find new physicians, determine plan participation and contact providers to schedule an appointment, which are all part of the member experience.
In addition, updating your information may:
- Help more members find you
- Reduce unnecessary calls to your practice
- Prevent you from having your directory listing disabled
Please complete the following actions to access the Self-Service Tool:
- Register for CareFirst Direct if you haven’t already as this will be the primary resource used to update and verify provider directory information. Refer to this user guide for assistance.
- To make updates to your directory information, you need 'Demographic Information' access within the provider portal. These updates include changes to name, address, specialty and phone number.
- If you are responsible for these updates and do not have 'Demographic Information' access, please review this user guide for instructions on how to verify and request access from your Portal Administrator.
- If your practice does not currently have an active Portal Administrator, contact the Help Desk at 877-526-8390 for assistance. This access is crucial to ensuring your practice can approve user access requests, complete required user access reviews, set up new users, and terminate user access as appropriate. Portal Administrators can access this resource for assistance managing user access requests.
- To update your digital contact information (i.e., practice/facility URL and email), send your changes to PicRequests@carefirst.com.
Where will I go to make updates?
Starting today, from the CareFirst Direct dropdown, providers can access the Provider Updates and Attestation link to attest and update your provider directory information.
To meet the requirements of the mandate, providers must attest/update their data by March 31. Then going forward, you must complete this process every 90 days, starting from the date that you last updated your information.
Additional Resources
If you aren’t using the self-service tool, please complete the Change in Provider Information form.
For detailed instructions to complete updates and attestations, please review our interactive user guide, Provider Directory Updates and Attestation, along with our Frequently Asked Questions.
For assistance with CareFirst Direct, you can find all of our interactive user guides under the Courses By Topic section of the Center for Provider Education.
What’s Next?
Be on the lookout for additional communications about the provider directory as it relates to the CAA Mandate.