Pacific Gas and Electric

A vendor incorrectly changed a printer press setting during maintenance resulting in errors on printed, explanation of benefit (EOB), letters for the covered entity (CE), Pacific Gas and Electric Company Health Benefits Plan. The CE's self-funded health plan is administered by a business associate (BA), Kaiser Permanente Insurance Company. The error impacted the letters of 2,426 individuals. The protected health information (PHI) involved in the breach included names, addresses, annual deductibles, annual out of pocket maximum, dollars spent “year to date” towards the deductible, and out of pocket maximums. The BA provided breach notification to HHS, affected individuals, and the media. Following the breach, a subcontractor BA responsible for printing the EOB’s updated its procedures to include additional oversight by its workforce members and additional print testing during printer updates or maintenance. OCR’s investigation resulted in the subcontractor BA improving safeguards in the printing of PHI.