Nebraska Settles With Company Regarding Overpriced COVID Tests

Nebraska Attorney General Hilgers announced a $4.87 million multistate settlement with GS Labs that resolves claims that the testing company overcharged patients, unlawfully charged administrative fees, and failed to deliver timely COVID-19 test results.

The multistate coalition investigated a number of problems with GS Labs’s nationwide testing practices from 2020 through 2022, including that:

• GS Labs intentionally advertised inflated “cash prices” for COVID-19 tests, sometimes as high as $380 per test or nearly $1,000 for multi-panel tests, that were used to justify overcharging patients with insurance coverage. And while GS Labs offered a “discount” from these “cash prices” to actual cash-paying patients, almost 30,000 patients still paid much more than market rate for their COVID-19 tests.
• For hundreds of thousands of patients, GS Labs guaranteed test results within three days and failed to deliver on its promise, sometimes taking a week or longer to get test results to patients.
• Despite advertising that patients with insurance would have no out-of-pocket costs, the company charged administrative fees as high as $49 per test to about 70,000 patients.

“Companies that take advantage of consumers during a difficult time during a pandemic need to be held accountable. GS Labs significantly overcharged Nebraskans for COVID tests. I’m proud of the work of our office alongside our partnering states to negotiate this settlement for consumers,” stated Attorney General Mike Hilgers.

Under the terms of today’s settlement, GS Labs will pay $3,628,718.34 in restitution to patients, including $1,843,375.99 for cash-paying patients that were overcharged for tests, $1,749,568.35 for patients that were charged administrative fees, and $33,692 for cash-paying patients that did not receive test results within three days. Nebraskans that were harmed by GS Labs’s testing practices will receive $1,113,386.60 in restitution through the settlement.

Source: Nebraska Attorney General’s Office