U.S. Healthworks, a chain of occupational and urgent care clinics, has agreed to pay $7.7 million to settle allegations it knowingly withheld millions of dollars in unclaimed property from the state of California.
The unclaimed property includes patient balances due to overpayments. As part of the settlement, U.S. HealthWorks will hand over $1.5 million in unclaimed property to the California Controller's Office, according to a Sept. 24 news release from the California Attorney General.
In March 2022, the California Attorney General filed a complaint alleging that the clinic chain held unclaimed property as early as 2001 and failed to file the required reports with the state until 2018, after being notified of an investigation.
Even after filing reports, U.S. HealthWorks allegedly underreported the amount of unclaimed property in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, according to the complaint.