topic Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009 in Rebuilding Your Credit

H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 17:03:45 GMT

I just wanted everyone to take a look at this bill currently in committee in the house. It would basically make every medical collection a PFD. http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h3421/text

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 17:46:36 GMT

Awesome!!!! Thank you for posting this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Boldilocks — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 18:28:26 GMT

Oh this would be fabulous for so many here! I wonder how long it's going to take!

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

DI — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 18:29:33 GMT

That's good news for those who had to deal with medical collections. It will save consumers the agony of getting such accounts deleted. I hope it passes.

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

newoutlook — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:13:13 GMT

Whooo!!! This would be a lovely if it passed because these are the only collections I have on my CR.

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

fused — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 21:27:09 GMT

This is wonderful news!

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

wndrwmn78 — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 23:39:59 GMT

This is fantastic! And it's about time.

I read this article yesterday about medical billing errors - very timely with this possible new bill:

http://redtape.msnbc.com/2009/08/scott-fedyshyn-and-his-wife-recently-brought-home-a-bouncing-baby-boy----and-an-unexpected-600-medical-bill-but-fedyshyn-a.html)

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 05:52:27 GMT

Also , many bills like this never make it out of committee. Here is a link to the members of the House Committee on Financial Services. If any of your representatives are on this list , take the time and contact them and let them know you support this bill.

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 05:53:18 GMT

http://financialservices.house.gov/members.html

sorry forgot the link

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:15:03 GMT

do you all think it will grandfather in existing reports or just start as of a certain date - assuming it gets passed

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

fused — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 20:29:59 GMT

Hard to say

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 14:33:47 GMT

Please also encourage the Co-Sponsors of this bill;

COSPONSORS(18), ALPHABETICAL

Rep Gutierrez, Luis V.

Rep Hare, Phil

Rep Hastings, Alcee L.

Rep Hinchey, Maurice D.

Rep Jackson, Jesse L., Jr.

Rep Perriello, Thomas S.P.

Rep Schakowsky, Janice D.

Rep Speier, Jackie

Rep Titus, Dina

Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009 (Introduced in House)
HR 3421 IH

111th CONGRESS

1st Session

H. R. 3421
To exclude from consumer credit reports medical debt that has been in collection and has been fully paid or settled, and for other purposes.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

July 30, 2009
Ms. KILROY (for herself, Mr. GUTIERREZ, Mr. MINNICK, Mr. PERRIELLO, Ms. SCHAKOWSKY, Mr. BACA, Ms. SPEIER, Mr. HINCHEY, Mr. ELLISON, Ms. MOORE of Wisconsin, Ms. FUDGE, Ms. KAPTUR, Mr. HASTINGS of Florida, and Mr. AL GREEN of Texas) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Financial Services

A BILL
To exclude from consumer credit reports medical debt that has been in collection and has been fully paid or settled, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the `Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009'.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSE.

(a) Findings- The Congress finds the following:

(1) Medical debt is unique because, unlike consumer debt, Americans don't get to choose when accidents happen or when their genetic traits will catch up to their health profile.

(2) Medical debt collection issues affect both insured and uninsured consumers.

(3) According to credit evaluators, medical debt collections are more likely to be in dispute, inconsistently reported, and of questionable value in predicting future payment performance because it is atypical and nonpredictive.

(4) Nevertheless, medical debt that has been completely paid off or settled can significantly damage a consumer's credit score for years.

(5) As a result, consumers can be denied credit or pay higher interest rates when buying a home or obtaining a credit card.

(6) Healthcare providers are increasingly turning to outside collection agencies to help secure payment from patients and this comes at the expense of the consumer because medical debts are not typically reported unless they become assigned to collections.

(7) In fact, medical bills account for more than half of all non-credit related collection actions reported to consumer credit reporting agencies.

(8) The issue of medical debt affects millions.

(9) According to the Commonwealth Fund, medical bill problems or accrued medical debt affects roughly 72,000,000 working-age adults in American.

(10) For 2007, 28,000,000 working-age American adults were contacted by a collection agency for unpaid medical bills.

(b) Purpose- It is the purpose of this Act to exclude from consumer credit reports medical debt that had been characterized as debt in collection for credit reporting purposes and has been fully paid or settled.

SEC. 3. AMENDMENTS TO FAIR CREDIT REPORTING ACT.

(a) Medical Debt Defined- Section 603 of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681a) is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:

`(y) Medical Debt- The term `medical debt' means a debt described in section 604(g)(1)(C).'

(b) Exclusion for Paid or Settled Medical Debt- Section 605(a) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681c(a)) is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:

`(7) Any information related to a fully paid or settled medical debt that had been characterized as debt in collection for credit reporting purposes, which, from the date of payment or settlement, antedates the report by more than 30 calendar days.'.

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:20:19 GMT

If you really want to see this gain momentum, you MUST contact your House Representative. It is VERY easy to do so via US Mail or Email.

You can find their contact information here; https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml

I amincluding a Sample Letter I wrote to my rep, please feel free to copy it or change it for your use:

_________________________________________________________________________________________

The Honorable _____________
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Representative __________,

I am writing to ask that you please support and co-sponsor the bill H.R. 3421; the Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009. I sincerely believe that this bill will greatly benefit millions of Americans and their families who have endured financial hardship due to medical conditions that are beyond their control. As I am sure you are aware, medical collection accounts affect an estimated seventy-two million working Americans adversely. It is estimated that a high percentage of these accounts are erroneous in nature, damaging the credit standing of those working Americans who rely on affordable credit to provide housing, transportation and other necessities to their families. Furthermore, honest, hard-working Americans who pay legitimate medical collection accounts in full are still unfairly and heavily penalized for many years after bringing their accounts into good standing. I believe that H.R. 3421, as written, will provide an effective, fair and timely remedy to resolve these issues that are impacting working families.

As your constituent, I implore you to support H.R. 3421. Americans have long needed this measure of protective legislation, but current circumstances make this issue especially urgent.

Sincerely,

Full Name
Full Address

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Tons_of_Debt — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:22:48 GMT

Fabulous! I know I used the old HIPAA process to have mine deleted, but this would make it a snap!

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Thunderseven — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 22:23:28 GMT

Have there been any updates on this subject?

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 22:34:11 GMT

none yet.. keep writing in to your rep!

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 20:09:57 GMT

WoW! This would be wonderful. DH's last collection is a paid medical collection. I would love it if this bill could wipe it off his report.

Thanks to FPP for making it so easy to contact my congressman! My email has been sent.

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 07:00:48 GMT

Good News

I sent off an email to my Congressman about where he stood on this bill and today he replied via an email that he is supporting this bill.

Hopefully more will sign on and then we can get it signed into law

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

Anonymous — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 22:10:51 GMT

Having to make this law is what the goal of this thread is, but i have to wonder, couldn't FICO voluntarily make a change to the formula to make a similar effect to the score? It would be a big step towards "the right thing".. Wonder how we could potentially get them on-board?

Re: H.R. 3421 Medical Debt Relief Act of 2009

valley_man0505 — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:11:03 GMT

I am currently going through a mess with a CA that is refusing to do a PFD and the OC says they can no longer accept payment. I am going to to try the HIPAA process anyway and hope for the best, but it sure would be nice if this would become a law ASAP. In my case, the stupid bills aren't even mine--they are from my ex-wife while we were still married. It is not even fair for people to be punished for their own medical surprises much less to be punished for someone else's medical surprises!