Isn’t certification nothing more than a tax on healthcare providers? Or, has someone seen some value in being certifed other than paying money to get money? For the large providers, the ARRA money will amount to little more than a rounding error on the total cost of their EHR.
I encourage you to look at John’s post about the cost of certifcation, http://www.emrandhipaa.com/emr-and-hipaa/2009/09/14/cost-of-new-cchit-ehr-certifications/comment-page-1/#comment-120681
It seems like a lot of money for no ROI.
Pale Rhino Consulting 
No value-add at all unless one considers the imposition of an arbitrary “standard” that will change on a ill-wind from DC to be a benefit. I think I also picked up somewhere that during a CCHIT cert session, if something fails, they will sit there with you and let you solve it so you don’t have to pay the entire cert fee again – the catch? It costs $2,000 per hour to have them look over your shoulder. That kind of audacity takes some very large… never mind – I’ll keep it family friendly. I love this business!
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Why would anyone think that certifying the application prior to implementing it is of any value? That’s like saying, “we vouch for the fact that it could work, but we won’t vouch for the fact that it still works now that you had your systems walk all over it.”
If you’re going to certify it, do it at the point of the food chain where it could possibly tie to the outcome.
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At least CCHIT indicates on the website that it’s a provisional cert (pre-market, eRX conditional, etc.) and they do a non-provisional cert (Fully Certified) after it’s live at a site. Still of little value and a great money making scheme. Kinda like JCAHO…
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You suggested a few weeks ago that we start offering certifications, it’s starting to sound like a good idea
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