This group's wiped out $6.7 billion in medical
debt, and it's just getting started
"Wait, what? Who does that?"
RIP Medical Debt does. The nonprofit has boomed during the pandemic, freeing patients of medical debt, thousands of people at a time. Its novel approach involves buying bundles of delinquent hospital bills — debts incurred by low-income patients like Logan — and then simply erasing the obligation to repay them.
Non-profit, I guess! How it do that?
It's a model developed by two former debt collectors, Craig Antico and Jerry Ashton, who built their careers chasing down patients who couldn't afford their bills.
...Eventually, they realized they were in a unique position to help people and switched gears from debt collection to philanthropy.
A philanthropy. The Bill and Melinda Gates Charitable Foundation. Where do they get their money? $6.7B is not chump change. A couple DEBT COLLECTORS?!
What triggered the change of heart for Ashton was meeting activists from the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011 who talked to him about how to help relieve Americans' debt burden. "As a bill collector collecting millions of dollars in medical-associated bills in my career, now all of a sudden I'm reformed: I'm a predatory giver."...
...They started raising money from donors to buy up debt on secondary markets — where hospitals sell debt for pennies on the dollar to companies that profit when they collect on that debt.
RIP buys the debts just like any other collection company would — except instead of trying to profit, they send out notices to consumers saying that their debt has been cleared.
Wow. They got donors to give over $6.7B to them to clear other peoples' med. debt. It doesn't sound to me the lure like a pic of a starving African child. (?)
The group says retiring $100 in debt costs an average of $1.
So they buy up this debt at a penny to the dollar with the money of Bill and Melinda Gates or Warren Buffet or yada. Jesus, great for them. It's just amazing.
RIP bestows its blessings randomly. [CEO Allison] Sesso says it just depends on which hospitals' debts are available for purchase. "So nobody can come to us, raise their hand, and say, 'I'd like you to relieve my debt.'".
Random is good. You fly under the radar and prevent "volunteers." Random is a blessing. Imagine getting a letter saying your house or car or student debt--or med. debt--has been paid off?!
...
A surge in recent donations — from college students to philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, who gave $50 million in late 2020 — is fueling RIP's expansion. That money enabled RIP to hire staff and develop software to comb through databases and identify targeted debt faster.
New regulations allow RIP to buy loans directly from hospitals, instead of just on the secondary market, expanding its access to the debt.
Sesso says the group is constantly looking for new debt to buy from hospitals: "Call us! We want to talk to every hospital that's interested in retiring debt."
Hospitals can volunteer.
...
RIP is one of the only ways patients can get immediate relief from such debt, says Jim Branscome, a major donor. ...Branscome...is a longtime advocate for the poor in Appalachia, where he grew up...
Appalachian here. Born in Miner's Hospital, Spangler, Pa.
...
...Heywood Healthcare system in Massachusetts donated $800,000 of medical debt to RIP in January, essentially turning over control over that debt, in part because patients with outstanding bills were avoiding treatment.
Hospital's DONATE! That's immense!
Well, cut me down and call me Shorty, that's a feel-good story! Thank you, NPR!