Appointed Counsel Vol. 1 - How a Claim is Paid

The Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts receives between 80,000 and 100,000 compensation claims per year from 95 counties across the state of Tennessee. In Appointed Counsel's premiere episode, host Joe Byrd sets out to explain the most efficient way to be paid, scenarios that cause delay and  walks listeners through the Indigent Services review process. 

Produced by David Stripling, Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts

Transcript

00;00;02;06 - 00;00;25;29
Joe Byrd, Host
Welcome to Appointed Counsel. A podcast presented by. Tennessee Court. Talk for those involved in indigent representation. I'm Joe Byrd, lead attorney for the indigent services team of the Tennessee Administrative Office of the courts. Today's episode. How a claim gets paid. Many times, attorneys and others ask, how is it that I submit a claim, but it takes several weeks for me to receive a payment.

00;00;26;02 - 00;00;49;07
Joe Byrd, Host
You need to understand a few things from the context. First of all, what is the AMC doing? We're basically charged with making sure that all claims will comply with rule 13 or for interpreters. Rule 42. Finance and administration requires us to follow certain policies for payments, and the Comptroller's office requires us to demonstrate that we enforce our rules.

00;00;49;13 - 00;01;21;22
Joe Byrd, Host
And the AOC receives between 80,000 and 100,000 claims per year. That's 2500 to 3000 claims per week. That's from all the courts in 32 judicial districts, in 95 counties. The Indigent Services team is made up of eight non lawyers. Four of them are first review auditors. They look at claims from all of the capital and non-capital cases. They look at delinquency, dependency, neglect cases, termination of parental rights cases, just about every other kind of case you can think of.

00;01;21;24 - 00;01;46;28
Joe Byrd, Host
Then we have one senior auditor and a compliance officer who's also the paralegal, who reviews interpreters, court reporters, experts and investigators. The final two auditors are senior auditors who provide second review. They look over all of the claims, and then they also batch the claims into the state's accounting system, which is known as Edison. Generally, claims are processed in the order of the date that they're receipt.

00;01;47;01 - 00;02;09;19
Joe Byrd, Host
We try to process these claims from the time that the judge approves them within 30 days. That doesn't include expert and investigators in court reporters. Those must be inputted in a manual system, but each auditor has to review between 250 and 300 claims per week just to stay on the schedule and whatever claim has to be returned for any reason, it delays that process.

00;02;09;21 - 00;02;47;21
Joe Byrd, Host
Once a claim is approved for payment by our team, then the payment is batched into the state accounting system. Edison. That voucher then is going to be reviewed by the Aox fiscal staff to ensure that it complies with all of the accounting guidelines and policies established by the Tennessee Department of Finance and Administration, or sometimes called FSA. Once this process gets moving, it involves both supplier maintenance, which is part of the Tennessee Department of Finance and Administration, and it involves the Strategic Technology Solutions, or SGS, the technology side of Tennessee state government.

00;02;47;23 - 00;03;09;21
Joe Byrd, Host
When claims are batched, a summary of each claim, and the attachments. Basically, what you would think of as a courtesy copy of your claim is forwarded and maintained by finance and administration. It's a public record, and therefore all personal identifying information has to be redacted from that document. Now, when a claim is processed by the state, all supplier information must be current.

00;03;09;23 - 00;03;33;11
Joe Byrd, Host
That means that your most recent address tax classification, legal name, tax ID must be in file in Edison, not just in the AOC. If the information is found not to be current, say a check is returned or returned correspondence such as a W9. Well, then the supplier Maintenance office is going to deactivate the supplier profile and payments will be held.

00;03;33;14 - 00;03;54;16
Joe Byrd, Host
The profile can only be reactivated when all current applicable documentation such as the name has been provided. If all supplier ID information is correct, then payments will be made via electronic funds or by check whichever one that you decide. This process is fairly involved, but our role we try to get done in about 30 days to get it turned around for you.

00;03;54;17 - 00;04;11;28
Joe Byrd, Host
Sometimes we fall behind, but we try our best. We hope that this episode gives you some context of why it takes some time to process your claim. We appreciate everything that you do for the citizens of Tennessee. For more information, check out the Indigent Representation web page at tncourts.gov