 TITLE: Can Medical Bills Hurt Your Credit? CONTENT: Do Medical Bills Affect Your Credit?\n------------------------------------\nSimply receiving a medical bill doesn't affect your credit score, of course. Neither does paying the bill a few days late. Medical bills affect your credit score only if a collection agency gets involved.\nIf you don't pay your bill and it becomes significantly past due, your health care provider may give up on collecting the debt from you and sell it to a collection agency. The collection agency then takes over the debt and starts contacting you to get payment.\nWhen exactly is a bill past due? Each health care provider's office has its own practices. Typically, providers wait 90 days before turning your medical debt over to collections; however, some providers will wait 180 days, while others will wait just 60 days.\nTo help standardize medical debt reporting and protect consumers' credit reports from being unduly affected by medical debt, the three major credit bureaus (Experian, TransUnion and Equifax) now employ a 180-day waiting period before medical debt appears in your credit history. This six-month grace period is designed to give you enough time to correct any errors on your bill, pay the bill or get your insurance company to pay it, figure out a payment plan or otherwise resolve the problem. By taking action within the 180 days, you can prevent medical bills from hurting your credit score. END