Terms Used In Florida Statutes 641.3108

  • Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
  • Health maintenance contract: means any contract entered into by a health maintenance organization with a subscriber or group of subscribers to provide coverage for comprehensive health care services in exchange for a prepaid per capita or prepaid aggregate fixed sum. See Florida Statutes 641.19
  • Health maintenance organization: means any organization authorized under this part which:
    (a) Provides, through arrangements with other persons, emergency care, inpatient hospital services, physician care including care provided by physicians licensed under chapters 458, 459, 460, and 461, ambulatory diagnostic treatment, and preventive health care services. See Florida Statutes 641.19
  • person: includes individuals, children, firms, associations, joint adventures, partnerships, estates, trusts, business trusts, syndicates, fiduciaries, corporations, and all other groups or combinations. See Florida Statutes 1.01
  • Subscriber: means an entity or individual who has contracted, or on whose behalf a contract has been entered into, with a health maintenance organization for health care coverage or other persons who also receive health care coverage as a result of the contract. See Florida Statutes 641.19
  • writing: includes handwriting, printing, typewriting, and all other methods and means of forming letters and characters upon paper, stone, wood, or other materials. See Florida Statutes 1.01

(1) Except for nonpayment of premium or termination of eligibility, no health maintenance organization may cancel or otherwise terminate or fail to renew a health maintenance contract without giving the subscriber at least 45 days’ notice in writing of the cancellation, termination, or nonrenewal of the contract. The written notice shall state the reason or reasons for the cancellation, termination, or nonrenewal. All health maintenance contracts shall contain a clause which requires that this notice be given.
(2) If cancellation is due to nonpayment of premium, the health maintenance organization may not retroactively cancel the contract to a date prior to the date that notice of cancellation was provided to the subscriber unless the organization mails notice of cancellation to the subscriber prior to 45 days after the date the premium was due. Such notice must be mailed to the subscriber’s last address as shown by the records of the organization and may provide for a retroactive date of cancellation no earlier than midnight of the date that the premium was due.
(3) In the case of a health maintenance contract issued to an employer or person holding the contract on behalf of the subscriber group, the health maintenance organization may make the notification through the employer or group contract holder, and, if the health maintenance organization elects to take this action through the employer or group contract holder, the organization shall be deemed to have complied with the provisions of this section upon notifying the employer or group contract holder of the requirements of this section and requesting the employer or group contract holder to forward to all subscribers the notice required herein.