The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau sent more than 60,000 debt collection complaints in 2022, and 8,500 (15%) of those were about attempts to collect a medical bill, according to the agency's annual Fair Debt Collection Practices Act report released in November.
Here are the most commonly reported medical debt complaints:
- The medical bill being collected has already been paid or should have been paid by someone else.
- Medical bills are being collected long after services were provided, sometimes even a decade after receiving medical care.
- Medical bills that patients have no prior knowledge of appear on their credit reports.
- The amount being collected was inaccurate.
Read the full report here.