Private patients owe more than £2.5m for treatment

Nearly £1.4m. of bills sent out by Health & Social Care had been overdue for between one month and one year.

And almost £1.2m. owed by private patients had been outstanding for more than one year.

The figures were revealed in a reply to a freedom of information request submitted late in 2022 which has not yet been published by the States, but has been seen by the Guernsey Press.

‘As at December 2022, the total owing for private treatments is £4.3m. This total includes £1.8m of current charges raised within the last 30 days,’ said HSC.

‘A sizeable proportion of this debt relates to insurance claims, which tend to be complex and typically take long periods to settle.’

HSC said that private patient income had brought it approximately £50m. over the past five years.

‘Private income makes a contribution to the cost of broader health service provision. It helps mitigate the cost of non-private services which would [otherwise] cost the taxpayer more.’

HSC said that £315,000 of private treatment costs had been written off, much of which related to bills dating back years.

‘All debt written off had been provided for in the States accounts but proactively chased through multiple intensive efforts.

‘Challenges have included UK visitors attending the Emergency Department [at the PEH]... and Guernsey residents leaving the island, complicating tracking of debtors. The private values can in many cases represent high value and low volume debt.

‘Write-off of debt is the last resort... and subject to escalation and approval, depending on value, to the most senior officers of the States.’

The freedom of information request also revealed that unpaid bills for services provided by the Emergency Department totalled £868,000 at the end of 2022.

This included £236,000 of charges raised in the previous 30 days, £140,000 which had been outstanding for up to six months and nearly £400,000 which had been outstanding for a year or more.