Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Virginia

Re: medical bills

Well this is tricky. On the one hand, you CANNOT

say or do anything to tell the hospital that there

is no estate. That would be fraud. So if they

want to think there is no estate, it cannot be

because you CAUSED them to think that.

On the other hand, hospitals and medical

facilities do have charity or hardship funds or

programs and if they are willing to forgive the

debt or pay it out of a hardship fund, they can

do that.

There is no obligation for them to pursue every

debt, and no obligation for you to encourage them

to pursue the debt.

As part of your responsibilities as executor, you

do have to publish a notice telling creditors

where they can send in their bills to try to get

paid. Ask the probate division of the circuit

court about exactly how to do this.

The purpose of this is to let creditors know that

they can submit their bills and hope to get them

paid off.

However, you are not required to FORCE people

to submit their bills, if they choose not to, or

don't bother, or don't care. A great many bills

are simply not collected in all sorts of

situations for all sorts of reasons.

So although you must give notice where people

can submit their claims, you don't have to go

out and drag people in and make them submit a

claim.

So if the hospital chooses not to submit a bill,

that is their freedom to do that (or not do it).

However, if you CAUSE them to believe a falsehood,

then you could be guilty of fraud by MAKING them

believe something that is not true. If they

believe there is no estate because they do not

bother to check or ask, that is their fault.

But if you lie to them, then it is your fault.

However... If the bills are much greater than

the value of the estate, and they knew that they

would only get a small part of the bill paid,

then they STILL might choose to forget about it,

even if they knew that there was "some" estate,

but a small one.

So I think the real question is not whether there

is officially an estate opened or not, but whether

there is enough money in it to pay the medical

bills. If the hospital knows they are not going

to get paid very much no matter what, then it

might not be worth their trouble to collect only

a small part of the bill.

That is particularly true if a hardship or

charity fund exists. By applying for such

treatment, the entire amount of the bill might

get paid by the charity fund. But if they

proceed with sending in a claim to the estate,

they might end up with nothing or very litte.