A Competition Authority investigation into possible price-fixing has led to hospital consultants being forced to hand over large volumes of documents on their relations with health insurance companies.
A month ago the Competition Authority issued a summons to the Irish Hospital Consultants' Association (IHCA) requiring it to provide all documents relating to consultants' fee agreements with VHI and BUPA Ireland between January 2001 and June 2004. These documents should have been delivered yesterday.
They included correspondence between the IHCA and the health insurance companies and between the association and its membership on fees during this period.
It is understood that the Competition Authority is particularly interested in the so-called "total cover" deal between the VHI and consultants.
Under this agreement the State-owned health insurance company offered higher fees to consultants in return for a commitment that they would not send balance or "top-up" bills to subscribers.
The VHI has claimed that the total cover deal was introduced because its members had complained for years that they were being asked to pay the "top-up" bills by consultants in addition to their health insurance subscription.
At present it is estimated that more than 90 per cent of consultants accept the VHI "total cover" payments which abolished balance billing.
This fee schedule offered by VHI to consultants is, in general, also followed by BUPA and the other small health insurance companies in the Irish market.
VHI pays out more than €200 million annually to hospital consultants under the total cover deal
However, it is understood that the authority was concerned that the deal represented a form of price-fixing between the insurance companies and the consultant bodies and that patients were not able to shop around for better deals.
In March 2000 the Competition Authority raided the offices of the Irish Hospital Consultants' Association seeking documents on the deal with VHI.
In a summons issued to the IHCA last month, the Competition Authority said that in 2003 it had decided to carry out an investigation under Section 30 (1) (b) of the Competition Act 2002 regarding a possible breach of Section 4 of the legislation by the IHCA and/or others in relation to discussions concerning the prices and/or quantities of medical services provided by consultants.
