Fresenius Management Services (NYSE:FMS; ETR:FRE) is reportedly closing its medical billing facility and laying off nearly 60 employees in North Olmsted, Ohio.
The company filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification on Oct. 4 saying that it would lay off 56 employees on December 6 and add one more employee to the layoffs on Jan. 31, according to a report in Crain’s Cleveland Business last week.
Fresenius will reportedly permanently close the operations at the PWA Great Northern Corporate Center in North Olmsted. The employees affected by the layoffs don’t belong to a union and have no bumping rights, according to Crain’s.
Fresenius Management Services is a division of Fresenius Medical Care North America, which provides kidney dialysis services.
Fresenius’ stock took a hit over the summer after the Trump administration announced plans to emphasize kidney transplants and home hemodialysis instead of in-clinic dialysis treatment.
The company has also had some recent troubles with federal prosecutors and the SEC. Last week, Fresenius Medical Care agreed to pay more than $5 million to resolve allegations that its dialysis clinic business over-billed Medicare for hepatitis B tests. I
In March, the company agreed to pay $231 million after the SEC said that it found that Germany-based Fresenius engaged in misconduct in Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Angola, Turkey, Spain, China, Serbia, Bosnia, Mexico, and eight countries in the West African region. The agency added that the misconduct occurred “against a backdrop where the company failed to have sufficient internal accounting controls.” The SEC found that the company made improper payments through a number of different schemes, including sham consulting contracts, falsifying documents and funneling bribes through a system of third-party intermediaries.
Shares of FMS were up 2.2% at $33.65 per share in mid-afternoon trading today.
