Laws and Regulations

The Improper Payments Information Act of 2002 (IPIA), Public Law 107-300, enacted on November 26, 2002, requires the heads of Federal agencies to review annually programs they oversee that are susceptible to significant erroneous payments, to estimate the amount of improper payments, to report those estimates to the Congress, and to submit a report on actions the agency is taking to reduce erroneous expenditures. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) identified Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) as programs at risk for significant improper payments. CMS developed the PERM program to comply with the IPIA [which has since been supplemented by the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act (IPERA), based on Executive Order 13520 and enacted on July 22, 2010]. 

In order to implement PERM, CMS published a proposed rule (FR/Vol. 69, No. 166/Friday, August 27, 2004), an interim final rule (FR/Vol. 70, No. 192/Wednesday, October 5, 2005), a second interim final rule (FR/Vol. 71, No.166/Monday, August 28, 2006), a final rule (FR/Vol. 72, No. 169/Friday, August 31, 2007) and a final rule (FR/Vol. 75, No. 154/Wednesday, August 11, 2010). CMS also published a Systems of Records notice for PERM (FR/Vol.71, No. 94/Tuesday, May 16, 2006).