CMS Healthcare Integrated General Ledger Accounting System (HIGLAS)

The CMS Healthcare Integrated General Ledger Accounting System (HIGLAS) is a single, integrated dual entry accounting system that standardizes and centralizes Federal financial accounting functions for CMS programs. HIGLAS, is the CMS system of record, began operation in 2005 and reduced over 50 reporting entities for Medicare and Medicaid into one consolidated general ledger system. The main objective of this effort was to leverage the use of commercial off the shelf (COTS) software in the federal government to increase automation and efficiency, and to maximize economies of effort to centralize management and save millions of taxpayer dollars that fund Medicare and Medicaid each year, while at the same time eliminating redundant and inefficient and ineffective manual processes. CMS implementation of HIGLAS was a strategic effort that resulted in improvements in the Agency accounting systems, financial management, and internal controls. The HIGLAS initiative accomplished: the establishment of an integrated general ledger accounting system that incorporated the financial data of every Medicare Administrative Contractor (MACs) into the CMS financial system of record, and the replacement of the CMS legacy accounting system of record, the Financial Accounting Control System (FACS). HIGLAS is a mission critical application enabling CMS to manage program accounting for its business operations. On an average, HIGLAS processes 4.4 million claims daily accounting for approximately 1.5 trillion in annual payment transactions, thus making it the largest Oracle Federal Financials System. HIGLAS continues to enhance oversight of financial operations, in order to achieve reliable, auditable, timely financial accounting, and reporting for programs and activities. The HIGLAS effort has significantly improved the ability of CMS and HHS to perform Medicare accounting transactions. These improvements and benefits attributable to HIGLAS include reduced costs due to elimination of redundant individual Medicare financial record systems, improvements in automated Medicare debt collection and referral activities, creation of audit trails for every Medicare transaction, payment and claim in HIGLAS, improved Medicare financial audit ability, and improved capability for CMS to more systematically and efficiently recover identified Medicare overpayments. Moreover, HIGLAS implementation has resulted in better internal financial controls across Medicare contractor operations. Implementation of HIGLAS has a significant and positive impact on the amount of additional interest earned (saved) in the Medicare Trust Funds. In addition, HIGLAS provided the capability for CMS and HHS to achieve compliance with the Federal Financial Management Improvement Act (FFMIA) of 1996.

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