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I work for a company that does TPL for numerous state Medicaid departments and CMS.
For the first five years of my TPL career, I was assigned to SGS. Then my Charlotte office was closed and all its functions were moved to Irving, TX. Fortunately for me, I was allowed to keep my job and work remotely. The only thing that really changed was my department. I was moved from SGS over to CAV.
About a year into my association with CAV, however, things went south. Not with my coworkers, mind you. I had a great working relationship with them. No, our problem was the Louisiana project. It was a stand alone project tied exclusively to Microsoft technology when I ran it in Charlotte. So I used a lot of VBA, ADO, and T-SQL to make sure we satisfied all of the project’s business requirements. But for some reason, the IT guys in Irving couldn’t duplicate my process in a DB2 environment. We were constantly having problems with the MCO, MSE, and PIER files. The PIER file was the worst. We could never get it right. I was told the problem had to do with REFDB, but nobody could pin it down. All we could do was make note of the problems in TRACK+ and hope some BA figured it out. Finally, the state of Louisiana had a enough and refused to renew our contract.
By all rights, I should have been unemployed once we lost the Louisiana contract. But the gods of good fortune smiled upon me and I got picked up by the midwest region of SGS for an open PM position. Yes, it was out of CAV and back into SGS. But SGS would not welcome me with another TPL project to toy with my sangfroid. No, I was going to learn all about RAC.
My new RAC PD has been great. I can’t say a single unflattering thing about her. She’s smart, industrious, and possesses outstanding management skills. The rest of my RAC coworkers are equally as competent and a joy to work with.
But RAC certainly has its problems. ZONE data is not dependable. And no matter how many times we go over the DS and BP process flows, HDI keeps generating letters for the wrong claims. For instance, if a claim is in appeal, it can’t be included in a FURE mailing. And if we don’t get HDI to stay on top of the PCALLOUTS, we’ll have a lot of ‘splaining to do for the client.
And today was one of those days. On most Thursdays, I have one or two PAs to process for the client. Today I had over two dozen. And then my supervisor IM’d me to remind me that the PRDs were due and I had until Friday to complete my online DEFECTS training. And, then, to make things even worse, the CI files were super late and I had to rip through my QA process like a banshee just to get the files on MOMENTUM by 5 pm.
Good, lord! No one ever said RAC was easy.
Final Thoughts
I’ve been working for my employer for almost nine years now. And I don’t think I’ve ever made it through a meeting without feeling like a complete idiot. With all the acronyms being bandied about, I don’t know what the hell people are talking about half the time. And of course I don’t say anything. I’d rather remain ignorant than expose my colossal ignorance. (Do behavioral psychologists have a name for that trait?)
The only thing that makes my acronym-happy workplace tolerable right now is that it won’t be my acronym-happy workplace for much longer. I truly respect and admire the people I work with. Saying goodbye to them is going to be really, really tough. But saying goodbye to those freakin’ acronyms is going to be a breeze. FIRE here I come!
Okay, groovy freedomists, that’s all I got. What say you? Is your workplace driving you crazy with acronyms?
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