You May Not Have to Pay Your Old Bill.
Sooner or later it happens to everyone: you’re having a great day, and then a bill arrives in the mail—a bill for something that happened months or even years ago. A plumber’s bill, a hospital bill—any business can suddenly think you owe them money for something you may not even remember very clearly.
If the invoice is that old, your first thought might be: Do I really have to pay it ? It’s quite reasonable to expect and assume that companies will bill you on time, and it’s completely natural to forget about the debt if the bill doesn’t arrive until years later. On the other hand, there is usually no legal requirement to send invoices on time , so companies may bill you months or even years after the fact. If it’s medical debt, there’s additional confusion about insurance coverage and, most notably, trouble understanding the bill in the first place. Here’s how to tell if you really need to pay an old bill.
Check your history
It’s not fun, but it’s time to dive into your old bank and credit card statements. If you don’t have paper copies on file, banks and credit card companies store your old statements on their servers for a certain period of time (usually about seven years), and you can usually contact them to order your old statements if you need. Please be aware that a fee may apply, especially if you are no longer a customer.
If you find that you have already paid the bill, gather your details (check number, payment date, any receipt you may still have) and write to the company that sent you the bill. Tell them that you do not acknowledge the debt and explain that it has already been paid.
Check the bylaws
If you have no record of paying off a debt or are unsure whether the debt is even legal, your next step is to check the statute of limitations for debt collection in your state. They vary, but are usually around six years. Most debts are considered to have “ expired ” at a certain point, and that “certain point” determines the statute of limitations. So, if the statute of limitations in your state is six years, after six years the statute of limitations expires.
However, it’s complicated: you still have a statute of limitations debt, but you no longer have a legal obligation to pay it . The company or person you owe this amount to can no longer sue you, but they can demand that you pay it (however, you can formally request that they stop contacting you about this). Bottom line: If the debt is time-barred and has expired, you are not legally obligated to pay it. Whether you should pay it or not is up to you and your conscience, but keep in mind that past due debt will still show up on your credit reports and will have a negative impact on your credit score for up to seven years.
Check your insurance
If the debt in question is medical in nature (or related in any way to other insurance), you should contact your insurer (even if it no longer covers you, for example if you have changed jobs in the meantime). You may be dealing with one of these scenarios:
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Balance billing : They may try to force you to pay the balance of your bill that is not covered by your insurance. Call your insurer (even if you’re no longer with them) and ask about their policies—many insurers prohibit balance billing in their contracts with hospitals and health care providers. Depending on the type of health care you received and the laws in your area, the health care provider may not be legally allowed to participate in billing at all, so it’s worth doing a little research.
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Recovering your mistake: The provider may have failed to submit an invoice to your insurer on time and now wants you to pay the full amount due to their mistake. Check with your insurer to see if a bill was ever submitted, if it was submitted correctly and within the stated time frame (usually around 90 days). If not, check if you can still send it to them. If your healthcare provider is in your insurance company’s network, they likely have a deadline to send bills, and if they fail to do so, it is not your responsibility. Write to your provider and ask for proof that they sent the bill to the insurer, and in the meantime contact your insurer and ask them to get involved.
If the bill was properly submitted to the insurance company and you are responsible for the amount, go back to the statute of limitations: If the statute of limitations has expired, you can legally ignore it.