AUBURN – Councilors could formalize a billing policy for people taken to the hospital in city ambulances.
Finance Director Jill Eastman said the city never set a collections policy into ordinances when the ambulance service started in 2014, relying on normal city collection practices.
“We never set the city of Auburn as the provider or said what to do with (noncollectable) or past-due bills,” Eastman said. “We think it’s necessary to lay it out to protect our citizens.”
Councilors tabled the changes until their July 18 meeting.
“We workshopped it tonight, and now we are going to a vote,” Councilor Bob Stone said. “I don’t think that’s adequate time for the public to make comments.”
In October 2014, Auburn sent medically trained firefighters to most medical emergencies reported in the city. Those crews would stabilize patients and hand them off to United Ambulance if they had to be taken to a hospital.
The city could not bill insurance companies for the costs of responding because city crews did not transport the patients. Insurers only pay for transporting patients. Instead, United Ambulance paid the city $100,000 per year to provide ambulance service.
Auburn’s new service began operating in mid-October 2014 with ambulances stationed at Central Fire Station on Minot Avenue and the Center Street fire station.
Eastman said she has billed for $2.2 million in ambulance transportation costs since the service started and has collected about $1.1 million. Much of the remaining balance is written off, she said.
Councilor Andy Titus said that’s what the new policy is meant to target.
“We want to make sure we have a way of collecting and saying what we do with bad debts and how we handle not getting full payment, say from Medicare,” Titus said.
The policy requires the city to consider financial hardships based on federal poverty guidelines and grants waivers or fee reductions based on income guidelines.
staylor@sunjournal.com
