Schedule of CWF Software Releases

70.6 - Schedule of CWF Software Releases (Rev. 4009, Issued: 03-23-18, Effective: 04-23-18, Implementation: 04-23-18) • Regular Releases - Scheduled quarterly releases normally contain changes due to both routine maintenance and new CMS mandates. Other changes included in a regular release shall be in response to issues submitted through the CWF Change Control Process or Sustainability CR’s requested by CMS. • Emergency Releases - Emergency off-quarter releases shall be in response to a critical problem prioritized as a P1 or P2, which causes a delay in processing, or causes claims not to be paid or paid incorrectly. An effective date for an emergency release shall be determined in advance by the CMS CWF team. Generally, an emergency release shall be distributed by the CWFM via telecommunications facilities and installed immediately by the CWF Hosts with the formal approval of CMS. The CWFM shall open a problem into the INFOMAN system for error tracking purposes when the emergency is confirmed. Technical assistance shall include analyzing requirements and debugging programs, data, or file structures that result in operational problems or that interferes with normal operational processing. The CWFM shall review, analyze, develop, and document each problem. The CWFM shall group problems according to functionality for the purpose of updating, correcting, modifying, and enhancing the CWF system software. • Special Releases - Special off-quarterly releases shall be provided as needed in response to situations which are of a particular or unusual date dependent nature. These releases shall be provided, for example, in response to a special project approved by CMS that may be of a high priority nature. The CWFM shall not move special releases to production without the permission of CMS. No less than 24 hours prior to the release moving to production, the CWFM shall send an email to the CMS CWF team requesting approval for implementing the special release. The email shall list all CRs and problem fixes scheduled for implementation. • Priority Releases - Priority off-quarter releases are scheduled in response to resolve as a follow-up to incomplete or inaccurate changes that are made due to any previous software release. They generally arise from problems in the system that was not evident prior to a release being implemented. Priority releases are generally scheduled bi-weekly, except during the final month of each quarter, where minimal changes are permitted. A production release date for a priority release shall be determined in advance by CMS CWF team, the CWFM and implemented with the formal approval of CMS. No less than 24 hours prior to the release moving to production the CWFM shall send an email to the CMS CWF team requesting approval for implementing the priority release. The email shall list all CRs and problem fixes scheduled for implementation.