Washington § 43.371.100 - Development of data set and business process to assist in determining commercially reasonable payment amounts and resolving out-of-network payment disputes for medical services covered under the balance billing protection act.

(1) The office of the insurance commissioner shall contract with the state agency responsible for administration of the database and the lead organization to establish a data set and business process to provide health carriers, health care providers, hospitals, ambulatory surgical facilities, and arbitrators with data to assist in determining commercially reasonable payments and resolving payment disputes for out-of-network medical services rendered by health care facilities or providers.

(a) The data set and business process must be developed in collaboration with health carriers, health care providers, hospitals, and ambulatory surgical facilities.

(b) The data set must provide the amounts for the services described in RCW 48.49.020. The data used to calculate the median in-network and out-of-network allowed amounts and the median billed charge amounts by geographic area, for the same or similar services, must be drawn from commercial health plan claims, and exclude medicare and medicaid claims as well as claims paid on other than a fee-for-service basis.

(c) The data set and business process must be available beginning November 1, 2019, and must be reviewed by an advisory committee established under this chapter that includes representatives of health carriers, health care providers, hospitals, and ambulatory surgical facilities for validation before use.

(2) The 2019 data set must be based upon the most recently available full calendar year of claims data. The data set for each subsequent year must be adjusted by applying the consumer price index-medical component established by the United States department of labor, bureau of labor statistics to the previous year's data set.

(3) Until December 31, 2030, the office of the insurance commissioner shall contract with the state agency responsible for administration of the database or other organizations biennially beginning in 2022, for an analysis of commercial health plan claims data to assess any impact that chapter 48.49 RCW or P.L. 116-260 have had or may have had on payments to participating and nonparticipating providers and facilities and on the volume and percentage of claims that are provided by participating compared to nonparticipating providers. To the extent that data related to self-funded group health plans is available within funds appropriated for this purpose, the analysis may include such data. The first analysis shall compare 2019 claims data to the most recent full year's claims data. The analysis must be published on the website of the office of the insurance commissioner, with the first analysis published on or before December 15, 2022.

Effective date—2022 c 263: "This act is necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety, or support of the state government and its existing public institutions, and takes effect immediately [March 31, 2022]." [ 2022 c 263 s 25.]

Findings—Intent—Effective date—2019 c 427: See RCW 48.49.003 and 48.49.900.