US · guidance
CMS Pub. 100-16, ch. 21, § 50.1.3
Distribution of Compliance Policies and Procedures and
Standards of Conduct
(Chapter 21 - Rev. 109, Issued: 07-27-12, Effective: 07-20-12; Implementation: 07- 20-12)
(Chapter 9 - Rev. 15, Issued: 07-27-12, Effective: 07-20-12; Implementation: 07-20- 12)
42 C.F.R. §§ 422.503(b)(4)(vi)(A), 423.504(b)(4)(vi)(A)
In order to be effective, compliance policies and procedures and Standards of Conduct
must be distributed to employees who support the sponsor’s Medicare business.
Distribution must occur within 90 days of hire, when there are updates to the policies,
and annually thereafter. Sponsors may choose their distribution method. Some examples
are furnishing hard copies at the time of hire and electronic copies thereafter, emailing an
electronic copy, or posting on the company intranet. The sponsors should have a method
to demonstrate that the Standards of Conduct and policies and procedures were
distributed to employees.
The Standards of Conduct should be written in a format that is easy to read and
comprehend. Sponsors should consider translating Standards of Conduct and policies
and procedures into other languages as necessary.
In order to communicate the sponsor’s compliance expectations for FDRs, sponsors
should ensure that Standards of Conduct and policies and procedures are distributed to
FDRs’ employees. Sponsors may make their Standards of Conduct and policies and
procedures available to their FDRs. Alternatively, the sponsor may ensure that the FDR
has comparable policies and procedures and Standards of Conduct of their own.
The sponsors should have a method to demonstrate that Standards of Conduct and
policies and procedures were distributed to FDRs’ employees. Sponsors or the FDR may
make the policies available through methods such as a fax blast, placement on an FDR
portal, in contract materials, etc. A best practice is to include appropriate contract
provisions in the FDR contract, coupled with periodic monitoring of a sample of FDRs
based on risk assessment, including a review of the FDRs’ compliance policies and
procedures and Standards of Conduct.
History
(Chapter 21 - Rev. 109, Issued: 07-27-12, Effective: 07-20-12; Implementation: 07- 20-12)
Provenance
- Source
- cms.gov
- Retrieved
- 2026-08-25
- Edition
- iom-2026-08-25
- Content hash
f383ae001a00a67b2f69c9bd659c69d0ec7dbd88fbc16280ef83f475aac17cf9
The link goes to the issuing authority’s own document — the one we read to produce this record. Where a source publishes whole titles rather than sections, your browser may need a moment to jump to the provision.
Unofficial copy of government-published law, reproduced from official sources with full provenance. Not an official publication; verify against official sources before relying on it in a filing. Records in the 'guidance' corpus, and only that corpus, are sub-regulatory (interpretive guidelines, survey procedures) and are not binding law. Validity bounds follow each jurisdiction's declared temporalBasis.