The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Department of Agriculture released additional guidance to all state health and human service agencies on January 23 on cost allocation plans and advance planning documents on eligibility systems serving multiple state health and human services programs. The new letter clarifies guidance provided on August 10 that design and development costs for new eligibility systems needed to implement health programs (Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and state-operated health insurance exchanges) under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) may be allocated in their entirety among those programs, even if the new eligibility systems also benefit other income-related programs (per a limited exception to OMB Circular A-87 section C. 3. cost allocation principles). The new letter offers guidance on 19 business processes and technical services to which this applies, such as client portals, user interfaces, business rules engines, data warehouses, information security and privacy controls, infrastructure and data center hosting, and telecommunications that are core elements of eligibility systems. It urges all state agencies to work together on the design and development of integrated eligibility systems but says that deadlines for completing work to implement the ACA will not be extended.  Systems needed to implement the ACA must be operational and fully tested by summer 2013.The letter is available under federal policy guidance at www.medicaid.gov.