Richmond University Medical Center: The 90-Day Window and What Sits Behind It

The window, and the law behind it

RUMC’s own summary gives 90 days after receiving services to submit an application. Treat that as the number to hit: an application filed inside a hospital’s stated window is an application nobody has to argue about.

What it is not is a wall. New York’s financial assistance law accepts applications at any stage of the billing and collection process, including after an account has gone to an agency. A hospital’s internal timeframe and the protection the statute gives you are two different things.

So if you are reading this four months after a visit, the sentence you need is:

“I understand your summary describes a 90-day window. State law accepts financial assistance applications at any stage of collections, and I am applying now. Please process the application and hold the account while it is pending.”

Get the response in writing. If it is a refusal, that written refusal is exactly what the Attorney General’s Health Care Bureau Helpline wants to see at 800-428-9071.

The group that never applies

RUMC’s summary describes assistance for patients with limited income who either have no health insurance, or have a balance remaining after insurance paid and cannot afford it.

That second half is the underused half, everywhere and here. People with coverage assume financial assistance is for the uninsured, receive a four-figure balance after their deductible, and pay it off over two years instead of applying.

New York goes further and makes it a legal category: if your out-of-pocket medical costs over twelve months exceed 10% of gross income, the law treats you as underinsured and the hospital’s caps apply to you. Count the whole year, not the bill in front of you, and keep the receipts.

Two things the hospital says plainly

Both are worth quoting because hospitals do not always say them out loud.

You cannot be denied medically necessary care because you need financial assistance. That is the hospital’s own language.

You may apply regardless of immigration status. Also the hospital’s own language, and it matches state law, which bars immigration status from being considered. What status does and does not affect.

How to apply

The floor that applies regardless

• At or below 200% of the federal poverty level: nothing out of pocket for medically necessary care
• 201% to 300%: no more than 10% of the Medicaid rate; 301% to 400%: no more than 20%
• No asset test, immigration status may not be considered, written decision in 30 days, no lawsuit below 400%, payment plans capped at 5% of monthly income and 2% interest, 180 days before collections
• Applications accepted at any stage, including after an account goes to a collection agency

Separately, New York bars hospitals and licensed providers from reporting medical debt to credit bureaus. The medical debt rules with dates.