Hi, I’m John Medler, personal injury lawyer with The Medler Law Firm – Personal Injury & Accident Attorneys. Today I’d like to talk to you a little bit about your health insurance and whether you have to pay your health insurance back out of your personal injury settlement. Let’s say that your Orange County personal injury lawyer has done a great job and they’ve just gotten you a personal injury settlement. The attorney has taken his share and now your share is left. But wait a minute, you might have to pay back part of your share to the health insurance company that paid part of your bills. Let’s say that you’ve got United or Blue Shield or something like that and they paid part of your bills. Can they come back and say they want to be paid back?
The answer is most of the time, yes. Let’s say for example that your health insurance is through your work or through your spouse’s work or through your parents work. If your health insurance is through your work, then it’s normally governed by federal law and the federal law says that basically whatever in your health care plan, whatever that says, that governs. And almost every time, at least everyone I’ve ever looked at, usually has provisions in there that allow the health insurance company to go back and get their money back. So if it’s through your work, the answer is almost certainly you’ll have to pay the health insurance company back if they figure out you’ve got a personal injury settlement.
What if it’s a private health insurance company though? Let’s say you and your spouse went and got private health insurance through Anthem or United or whoever it may be. What about that? In nearly every state, that’s 42 out of the 50 states including California, same thing goes there. They will be able to come back and get reimbursement for the amount that they paid. In only eight states, one of which is Missouri, the health insurance company is not allowed in a private health insurance company scenario to come back and get reimbursement out of your personal injury settlement.
This is a complicated area so you may want to consult an experienced Orange County personal injury lawyer. If you have any more questions about whether you’re going to have to take any part of your personal injury settlement and pay it back to your health insurance company, check out our website at www.MedlerLawFirm.com.
