The County Board of Supervisors in Riverside, California is
renewing their contract with Delaware-based collection agency Hospital Billing
& Collection Services (HBCS). Under the new contract, HBCS will continue to
provide services for the Riverside University Medical Center (RUMC) in Moreno
Valley.
HBCS first signed to work with RUMC in November 2015, under
direction from the Riverside County Board of Supervisors to concentrate on collecting
from individuals owing $5,000 or less and older “legacy” accounts. The Banning
Patch reports that HBCS collected $7.8 million in the past year, almost
double the $4 million expected by the county. This period of success for RUMC comes
after a taxpayer-funded reorganization following years of the hospital having
multimillion-dollar deficits.
Officials at RUMC note in particular that HBCS does business
the right way, having not been the subject of a single complaint during the
course of their work with the hospital. Given their track record thus far, HBCS
will be handling more of RUMC’s accounts under the new contract.
According to the hospital, collections could potentially
total over $33 million between now and July 2017. HBCS is estimating that with
their collection fee of 6%, they could receive over $2 million from the county
over that time period.
