The Department of Justice announced on February 3, 2017, that penalties for the False Claims Act (FCA) will be increasing once again, effective immediately. The minimum per-claim penalty will increase from $10, 781 to $10,957 as a pursuant to the 2015 budget bill that calls for annual re-indexing of FCA penalties for inflation. On the other hand, the maximum per claim penalty will increase from $21,563 to $21,916.
Under the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, all federal agencies are required to increase the civil monetary penalties as an annual cost of living adjustment. For the record, prior to the enactment of the budget bill, FCA penalties were last adjusted in 1986. This increase applies to all FCA penalties for violations that occurred on or after November 2, 2015.
