My mom died July 15, 2018. I received a letter from Medicaid stating they are trying to recover the $32,000.00 they paid out on Mom for services. They want to know from her estate (which is me) all about her assets. Which were none obviously because she qualifies for Medicaid. She only had $6,000.00 in life Insurance which I paid for over the years and had to drop a lot because Medicaid said it was to much. She received her SS, which August payment will be returned to Medicare, she owned no homes, no cars, no anything. If she did she wouldn’t qualify for Medicaid.
She had no will, no assets, nothing. So what do they expect? I have on my credit card where I paid for her cremation and she is still in my living room and some of her ashes went back to be buried with her parents. She was poor in material things but rich in love. I loved her more than anything. Please help me to understand what they want. Thank you...it has been a very rough month.
Your mom is actually in debt to you for the cremation so you are first in line for any money because funeral expenses must be paid before anything else - this is to stop families from doing a bang up funeral & not being able to pay for it -
Tell medicare to stand in line & that is not your debt so don't pay for it - these gov't [& bank etc] people will try to tell you that you are responsible but most often legally you are not ............. if you pay you are a chump & deserve to be without that money - talk to a lawyer if they persist
This also generally applies IF they determine the child(ren) can afford it. Seems pretty obvious that you cannot get $ from anyone who does not have it! They can still sue, but if the child(ren) make bare minimum and have no assets, they are not likely to get anything.
So, even if you are in one of those states that have this filial law, DO NOT pay Medicaid ANYTHING from your own assets. She had nothing, they get nothing. As others have said, it is probably standard operating procedure, but you would think they would give you a little time to grieve before slapping you with this! Hopefully their "form" letter also includes a sympathy line, but it would surprise me if it doesn't.