Current Ethical Issue in Business Paper

Current Ethical Issue in Business
Recently the scooter store founded in 1991 has had setbacks that led the company in laying-off 1800 employees. Later that week some 300 employees where brought back to continue working for the company. The scooter store serves some 700,000 senior citizens and individuals with disabilities by providing their customers with mobility. The scooter store is the nation’s largest suppliers of power wheelchairs and scooters. Recently, the store has had some setbacks due to Medicare changes that have affected the company leading to downsize the company’s employees (Danner, February 2013).
The Issue
Since 2005 The Scooter Store has been under speculation for defrauding Medicare and Medicaid. While the amount of money is up for debated, it is believed that The Scooter Store has overbilled Medicare by as much as 108-million dollars. In 2007 The Scooter Store agreed to pay a $4 million fine and surrender $43 million in Medicare claims because of the allegations in defrauding the government. Medicaid fraud has become a huge issue and the government is cracking down on those that abuse the system. CBS News did an investigation and claimed that employees were pressuring doctors and even seniors to get these devices even though they were not really needed. There is speculation that power-mobility devices are being prescribed to people that don’t actually need them. The doctors were pressured with phone calls and visits until they wrote the prescriptions then Medicare would issue a check to The Scooter Store. The Scooter Store employees used a ranking system to know which doctors were more likely to prescribe a mobility device. Due to the crackdown there will be a more rigorous process to receive authorization to own one and the Center of Medicaid and Medicare services “will pay on average 36