Temporary service limitation during the performance year transition

[Beneficiary Claims Data API (BCDA) Community]

BCDA data limited in Jan 2026 for yearly updates 

Hello BCDA community, 

There will be a temporary limitation to the data available from BCDA in January 2026 while CMS updates beneficiary attribution for the new performance year (PY 2026). Until BCDA receives your model entity's attribution information for PY 2026, you will not be able to request current or new claims data from the API. 

Temporary data limitations starting 01/2026

• You will only be able to request "runout" data from BCDA from PY 2025. Use the `runout` identifier with the /Group endpoint to return data for enrollees attributed to your organization in PY 2025. 

  • Claims with a service date in 2026 will be excluded. The claims returned will have a service date no later than December 31, 2025. 

  • You can use the _since parameter with the `runout` identifier to only return data updated since your last runout request.

  • Review our documentation and example requests for runout data. 

• You will not be able to make requests to the /Group/all or /Patient endpoints. These requests will result in an OperationOutcome error.

Normal functionality will be restored to individual entities as soon as their data is ready. This typically takes 1 month. We’ll notify you here when the limitation ends for each supported model. At that point, you can use the `all` identifier to request data, including 2026 claims, with the /Group and /Patient endpoints as usual.

Example requests and outcomes using BCDA in January 2026

• A caller makes a request to the /Patient or /Group endpoint using the `all` identifier.

  • GET /api/v2/Patient/$export

  • GET /api/v2/Group/all/$export

• The caller receives a 404 Not Found response and an OperationOutcome error.

  • An example OperationOutcome.fhir.json is attached. Callers should use the /api/v2/Group/runout/$export endpoint.

• A caller makes a request to the /Group endpoint using the `runout` identifier.

  • GET /api/v2/Group/runout/$export

• The caller receives a 202 Accepted response.

  • Content-Location header sent with the job location.

  • Content-Location: /api/v2/jobs/{job_id}

• A caller polls the /Jobs endpoint until the job completes.

  • GET /api/v2/jobs/{job_id}

• The caller can now download the job data.

  • GET /data/2/output.json

  • All claims data will be capped at December 31, 2025.

Please respond to this email if you need help or have questions.

- The BCDA Team

[Samuel Wang]

Hi BCDA Team,

I just wanted to verify that the statement that "The caller receives a 404 Not Found response" is correct. We saw a 500 error last year, with the text "awaiting new attribution information at the beginning of a Performance Year" in the response, and have used that to detect the annual maintenance error. I would like to get a confirmation about the exact status code and response text that will be used for 2026 to ensure that our control flow works currently. Any advice is much appreciated!

Thanks,

Samuel

Samuel   Wang ​​​​ Software Engineer II (647) 994‑5133 |  samue...@pearlhealth.com 220 5th Avenue, 17th Floor, NY, NY 10001 www.pearlhealth.com

This email address should not be used to communicate private, confidential or sensitive information, including, but not limited to, personal health information protected by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, Public Law 104-191, as amended and its implementing privacy, security and breach notification regulations ("Protected Information"). If you need to send a communication to the sender of this email or any Pearl Health personnel containing Protected Information, please send an email to he...@pearlhealth.com indicating your need, but not containing the Protected Information, so that you can be provided instructions respecting use of a secure channel.