44-712.

Sickness and accident insurance; good faith estimate; requirements; effect.

(1) Any individual or group sickness and accident insurance policy or subscriber contract, any hospital, medical, or surgical expense-incurred policy, and any prepaid dental service plan that is issued for delivery, delivered, or renewed in this state, except policies that provide coverage for a specified disease or other limited-benefit coverage and health maintenance organization contracts, that provides for payment of claims based upon a specific methodology including, but not limited to, usual and customary charges, reasonable and customary charges, maximum benefit allowance, or charges based upon the prevailing rate in the community, shall provide that, upon request, a policyholder, certificate holder, covered dependent, or authorized representative shall be provided a written statement that includes a good faith estimate of the dollar amount of the allowable benefit for a service or procedure if the request includes information regarding any service or procedure to be performed by a nonpreferred provider, including any service or procedure code number or diagnosis related group provided by the health care provider and the health care provider's estimated charge.

(2) A statement requested pursuant to this section shall be sent to the policyholder, certificate holder, covered dependent, or authorized representative within ten business days after receipt of the request from the policyholder, certificate holder, covered dependent, or authorized representative.

(3) The insurer or other entity that provides a statement pursuant to and in compliance with this section shall not be bound by a good faith estimate, except that a pattern of providing estimates that vary significantly from the ultimate payment shall be an unfair claims settlement practice subject to the Unfair Insurance Claims Settlement Practices Act.