Medical Debt Negotiation Calculator

Estimated Settlement % starts at a flat 50% baseline, then applies fixed-point adjustments for how overdue the debt is, whether you can pay in one lump sum, and your credit score bracket, and finally clamps the result between 20% and 90% (lines 58-88). The months-overdue adjustment is written as exact boundary checks (lines 62-70) — 3 months or less adds 10 points, 6 months or less adds nothing, 12 months or less subtracts 10, and anything beyond that subtracts 15 — so at this calculator's own default of exactly 6 months overdue, nudging Months Overdue up even a fraction crosses out of the "6 or less" band into the "12 or less" band and drops the modifier by a full 10 points; that single boundary crossing accounts for an 18% swing in Estimated Settlement % across a ±10% probe on Months Overdue. Total Medical Debt, by contrast, has exactly zero effect on Estimated Settlement % — it never enters that formula at all (lines 61-88), so comparing its influence there isn't meaningful; Total Medical Debt's real effect shows up only on the dollar-amount outputs. On those dollar outputs, though, neither continuous input is actually the biggest driver — Can Pay Lump Sum is. It's a Yes/No selector, not a number a percentage probe can move, but flipping it swings the basePercent adjustment by a full 15 points (-10 for "Yes" versus +5 for "No," lines 73-77), which moves Settlement Amount by about 27% and Savings from Full Price by about 33% from this calculator's own default — bigger than either continuous input's swing on those same outputs.

Among just the two continuous inputs, Total Medical Debt's ±10% span (about 20% of Settlement Amount, since Settlement Amount is a direct dollar-for-dollar multiple of it) narrowly edges out Months Overdue's boundary-crossing effect there (about 18-19%). Because Estimated Settlement % drops at that boundary, Settlement Amount also drops, but Savings from Full Price actually rises slightly more (about 22% across the same ±10% probe) — a lower negotiated settlement means bigger savings, even though the debt itself hasn't changed. Recommended Monthly Payment collapses to exactly $0 the instant Can Pay Lump Sum is switched to "Yes" (lines 93-95), a branch that testing a percentage swing on the field can't demonstrate, because that field is a Yes/No selector, not a number you can move up or down by a percentage. This calculator does not account for tax consequences of forgiven medical debt, the specific hospital or collection agency's actual policies, or the risk that a low lump-sum offer gets rejected outright.