If you don’t have a valid Notice of past benefits when your claim settles or reaches judgment, your compensation payer can pay:
- us a 10% advance of your compensation payment
- you the remaining 90%.
We must get this advance payment and the completed settlement documents from the compensation payer within 28 days of judgment or settlement.
When we get the completed documents, we’ll send you a new Medicare history and care services statement and Declaration. You must complete these and send them back by the due date on the notice. This is so we can work out how much you need to pay, and issue you a Notice of charge for your Medicare compensation.
Read more about completing the Medicare history statement and Declaration.
If you didn’t return your completed Medicare history and care services statement and Declaration by the due date, we’ll consider all services listed on the statement as relevant to the compensable injury or illness. You’ll need to repay us the total amount owed.
If the amount due is less than the advance payment, we’ll refund the difference to you. We’ll do this within 28 days of issuing a Notice of charge. This may be up to 3 months after we get your advance payment and completed documents.
If you’d like an electronic refund, complete a Medicare Compensation Recovery Bank account details collection form.
It may take longer than 3 months to pay you if we’ve:
- granted you an extension
- asked you to review your Medicare history and care services statement and Declaration
- determined the settlement documents provided by the compensation payer are incomplete.
If the amount due is more than the advance payment, you’ll need to pay us the difference. We must get this payment within 28 days of issuing the Notice of charge.