The first question you need to ask is whether or not your local hospital is a nonprofit or for profit hospital. Why is that important? Because many hospitals are nonprofit hospitals and according to Obamacare, they are required to offer qualifying patients a lower rate. Patients who earn a lower income or have no income at all are eligible for charity care – meaning lower bills for their treatment.

However, it’s been discovered that some nonprofit hospitals not only don’t offer the charity assistance, but refuse to give it to patients who ask for the assistance. If proven they are doing this, they could lose their nonprofit status and end up paying tens of thousands of dollars in taxes.

Take the case of Ashley Pintos:

When Ashley Pintos went to the emergency room of St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, Wash., in 2016, with a sharp pain in her abdomen and no insurance, a representative demanded a $500 deposit before treating her.

“She said, ‘Do you have $200?’ I said no,” recalled Pintos, who then earned less than $30,000 at a company that made holsters for police. “She said, ‘Do you have $100?’ They were not quiet about me not having money.” But Pintos, a single mom with two kids who is now 29, told state officials St. Joseph never gave her a financial aid application form, even after she asked.

Pintos said she was examined and discharged with instructions to buy an over-the-counter pain medication. Then St. Joseph sent her a bill for $839. When she couldn’t pay, the hospital referred the bill to a collection agency, which she said damaged her credit and resulted in a higher interest rate when she applied for a mortgage.

What happened to Pintos is not an isolated incident as you may be thinking as reported:

Under the Affordable Care Act, nonprofit hospitals like St. Joseph are required to provide free or discounted care to patients of meager incomes — or risk losing their tax-exempt status. These price breaks can help people avoid financial catastrophe.

And yet nearly half — 45% — of nonprofit hospital organizations are routinely sending medical bills to patients whose incomes are low enough to qualify for charity care, according to a Kaiser Health News analysis of reports the nonprofits submit annually to the Internal Revenue Service. Those 1,134 organizations operate 1,651 hospitals.

Together, they estimated they had given up collecting $2.7 billion in bills sent to patients who probably would have qualified for financial assistance under the hospitals’ own policies if they had filled out the applications.

Therefore, if you have a limited income or no income and find it necessary to visit your local hospital, you need to find out if that hospital is a nonprofit. If they are, they are required to provide you some financial assistance and if they don’t, they could well be in violation of the Affordable Care Act. By taking the time to find out the status of your local hospital could well save you hundreds of dollars as well as your credit ratings.