[Asia Economy Reporter Je Moon-won] The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on the 6th that it will publicly notify the amendment to the "Enforcement Rules of the Automobile Damage Compensation Guarantee Act," which mainly strengthens the review of medical expenses for automobile insurance, for 40 days starting from the 7th.
This amendment was prepared to prevent false or unfair claims of medical expenses for automobile insurance by medical institutions and to expand the opportunity to raise objections to the review results of medical institutions and insurance companies.
First, on-site verification reviews for medical institutions will be strengthened.
Currently, the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA) requests medical institutions to submit materials for suspected cases of false or unfair claims, and on-site verification reviews can only be conducted if the submission is refused or the submitted materials are insufficient. Therefore, there have been many criticisms that the effectiveness of the review is reduced.
Accordingly, similar to other public insurances (health insurance and industrial accident insurance), on-site verification reviews can be conducted when it is necessary to verify the facts regarding the claim details or submitted materials of medical institutions.
The objection period and processing period for review results will also be extended.
The objection period will be extended from the current 25 days to 90 days, and the objection processing period by HIRA will be extended from the current 30 days to 60 days.
As a result, cases where disputes could not be properly resolved due to the short period are expected to significantly decrease.
Lee Jae-yeon, head of the Automobile Insurance Team at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, said, "With this amendment to the enforcement rules, more reasonable reviews of automobile insurance medical expenses will be conducted, and unnecessary insurance payments due to false or unfair claims of medical expenses are expected to decrease."
The amendment will go through consultations with related ministries and review by the Ministry of Government Legislation, and is scheduled to be promulgated in October and come into effect on January 1 of next year.
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