(a) CMS or the facility's contractor notifies each facility of changes in its payment rate. This notice includes changes in individual facility payment rates resulting from corrections or revisions of particular geographic labor cost adjustment factors.

(b) Changes in payment rates resulting from incorporation of updated cost data or general revisions of geographic labor cost adjustment factors are announced by notice published in the Federal Register without opportunity for prior comment. Revisions of the rate-setting methodology are published in the Federal Register in accordance with the Department's established rulemaking procedures.

(c) Effective for items and services furnished on or after January 1, 2011 and before January 1, 2012, CMS adjusts the composite rate portion of the basic case-mix adjusted composite payment system described in § 413.220 by the ESRD bundled market basket percentage increase factor.

(d) Effective for items and services furnished on or after January 1, 2012, CMS updates on an annual basis the following:

(1) The per-treatment base rate and the composite rate portion of the basic case-mix adjusted composite payment system described in § 413.220 by the ESRD bundled market basket percentage increase factor minus a productivity adjustment factor.

(2) The wage index using the most current hospital wage data.

(3) The fixed dollar loss amount as defined in § 413.237 of this part to ensure that outlier payments continue to be 1.0 percent of total payments to ESRD facilities.