Hospital Price Transparency Rule (2019-2021)
CMS required hospitals to post machine-readable files of their standard charges, including negotiated rates with insurers. The rule took effect January 1, 2021, after surviving legal challenges from hospital groups.
Hospitals posted files of varying quality; many were large, hard to parse, or incomplete.
The rule set the template for insurer transparency, and the FTC has since warned hospitals against deceptive pricing practices.
The new insurer rule aims to align its data format with the hospital rule so the two can be compared.
