Personal Injury Settlements: Negotiate a Lower Price

Negotiating a decrease with the lien holder is critical if you are dealing with the Medicare plan or a hospital debt. Liens might seize your whole injury compensation if you don't negotiate a decrease. Lien reduction is a difficult procedure that is unique to each circumstance. As a result, negotiating a lien reduction without first consulting an attorney is not advised. A discount offer might be made on a few different reasons. 

Equal Reduction vs. Pro-Rata

Pro-rate is a euphemism for proportionate. A pro-rata reduction is typically necessary if the lienholder requests more money than you are expected to obtain from your accident settlement. A pro-rata reduction indicates that the lien holder's share of the overall settlement sum is reduced. For example, a normal pro-rata arrangement for persons with attorneys is as follows: the beneficiary receives a third of the settlement, their attorney receives a third for attorney costs, and all other lien holders share the remaining third proportionately to their lien size. 

Cost Cutting That Is Reasonable

When the hospital issue liens, this decrease is far more prevalent, but a realistic cost reduction is one that is based on actual medical care expenses before all of the excessive, for-profit markups. In many cases, hospitals charge 10 times the cost of a surgery. In most cases, state rules provide those hospitals may only collect a reasonable amount for services performed in their lien. Every year, hospitals submit a cost report to Medicare. You have a decent chance of winning a big decrease in the lien if you can demonstrate the real cost of your therapy and give a modest 50 percent profit margin on the cost. 

Recoverability Rights

Only if the beneficiary gets a settlement is a lienholder eligible to collect. Assume the lien is too substantial to make the lawsuit worthwhile to settle. There, the beneficiary may choose not to accept the injury compensation, providing him or her negotiation power. To guarantee that they can achieved some sort of recovery, the lienholder will try to reach an agreement that is agreeable to all parties. Third-party firms like are more likely to engage in this type of discussion. They are significantly less flexible when working directly with Medicare. Medicare has a set of extremely defined grounds and criteria for reducing the amount of their lien.

Get a decrease in writing if you can and pay close attention to any deadlines if you receive a letter requesting with a decrease amount. A letter, for example, may provide a thirty-day window in which to make payment on the reduced sum before the offer expires. Before making any payments, contact the lienholder to either negotiate a new reduction or obtain a fresh letter with the same reduced amount. The last letter from Medicare specifies a date after which interest on the lien amount will begin to accrue if it is not met. When you're nearing a settlement with the liability insurance, it's a good idea to negotiate reductions. You'll be able to make a payment as soon as a reduction agreement is reached in this method.