Christine Jordan Sexton
A bill that puts teeth into Florida’s pharmacy benefit management laws cleared its last Senate committee Monday.
Filed by Sen. Tom Wright, the bill (SB 1476) authorizes the Office of Insurance Regulation to levy up to a $10,000 penalty against pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) that don’t register with the state. Twenty lobbyists registered to lobby the Senate bill.
The bill cleared the Senate Committee on Appropriations unanimously without debate or fanfare and is now ready for the Senate floor.
Pharmacy benefit managers are responsible for managing the pharmacy benefits of about 270 million Americans. The staff analysis of the bill shows there are 66 PBMs registered in the state. Express Scripts, CVS Caremark and OptumRx have a combined market share of more than 89%.
The bill builds off the Florida Pharmacy Act, initially passed in 2014 and amended in 2018. The 2018 bill, signed into law by Gov. Rick Scott, required PBMs to register with the Office of Insurance Regulation by Jan. 1, 2019. That law did not provide for enforcement of the registration requirement.
The initial 2014 law established the rights that pharmacists are entitled to while being audited. Pharmacists are entitled under existing law to have seven days’ advance notice before any initial onsite audit can be conducted. Florida law precludes PBMs and insurers from conducting audits on claims that had been submitted or settled more than 24 months from the audit date.
The House of Representatives passed a nearly identical bill, (HB 357), filed by Rep. Jackie Toledo last week. One hundred lobbyists have registered to lobby HB 357, which is nearly identical to the Senate bill.
