PIP and med-pay rules in Kentucky

Kentucky is a no-fault state for car crashes, and a specific kind the statute calls "choice" no-fault. Personal injury protection here has a different name: Basic Reparation Benefits, usually shortened to BRB. It pays your medical bills, lost wages, and certain other costs after a wreck no matter who caused it.¹ Those rules live in the Motor Vehicle Reparations Act, KRS Chapter 304 Subtitle 39, and part of that act was rewritten this year. House Bill 627 took effect July 15, 2026, raising several benefit amounts and changing how medical bills get paid.² Whether the new numbers apply to you turns on when your policy was issued or renewed, not the date you were hurt.

What basic reparation benefits cover

Every Kentucky auto policy has to include BRB, and anyone hurt in a crash (driver, passenger, or pedestrian) can claim it without proving fault.³ The benefit is capped at $10,000 per person, per accident, for all economic loss combined.¹ That $10,000 ceiling did not change in 2026.

Inside the $10,000, BRB pays for:

• Medical expenses for reasonable and necessary treatment.
• Work loss, meaning your lost wages while you can't work.
• Replacement services, or money to hire out household tasks you can't do while hurt.
• Survivor benefits and a funeral allowance if the crash is fatal.¹

Before July 2026, the weekly cap on lost wages and replacement services was $200.⁴ HB 627 raised that weekly cap to $500 and lifted the funeral benefit from $1,000 to $5,000.² Lost wages are still limited to 85% of your gross income even under the higher cap. Because the $10,000 aggregate stayed the same, the bigger weekly rate mostly means the money reaches you faster. At $500 a week, wage benefits alone can use up the pool in about twenty weeks instead of fifty.

The medical-billing change most people miss

The quieter half of HB 627 changed how your BRB medical bills are priced. For policies issued or renewed on or after July 15, 2026, providers billing PIP are paid under Kentucky's workers' compensation medical fee schedule (KRS 342.035) instead of their full billed charges.²⁵ That schedule sets a ceiling on what a doctor or hospital can collect from your no-fault coverage.

A protection rides along with it. A provider paid under the schedule can't balance-bill you for the gap between its sticker price and the scheduled amount, and it isn't supposed to send that balance to collections or report it against your credit.² HB 627 also gave providers a 180-day deadline to submit PIP claims.⁶ Miss that window, and a provider can lose the right to collect from your benefits at all.

PIP is mandatory, but you can reject it

BRB comes built into every Kentucky policy. You can reject it in writing, together with the tort limits that no-fault carries, under KRS 304.39-060.⁷ The Department of Insurance keeps those rejections on file, and a driver's rejection status can be verified by filing the department's NFV-1 form with a $5 fee.⁴

Rejecting rarely makes sense, and it makes even less after 2026. Opt out and you give up the $10,000 in first-dollar benefits, the higher $500 weekly wage cap, and the balance-billing shield that now protects you from provider charges above the fee schedule.² You also leave the no-fault system's tort limits, which changes both who you can sue and who can sue you.

Deadlines and overdue payments

Your insurer has to move quickly on a BRB claim. A payment is overdue if it isn't made within 30 days after the company gets reasonable proof of the fact and amount of your loss.⁶ Overdue benefits carry 12% annual interest. If the delay had no reasonable foundation, the rate rises to 18% and you can recover your attorney's fees for making the company pay.⁶⁸

The deadline to sue the at-fault driver is a separate rule, and Kentucky's version is unusual. You generally have two years, but the clock runs from the crash date or from the date of your last BRB payment, whichever comes later.⁹ Because PIP payments can push that date forward, an active BRB claim can extend the time you have to file suit. Confirm the exact dates before relying on it, because a blown deadline ends the case.

Med-pay and added PIP are not the same thing

People use "PIP" and "med-pay" as if they mean one thing. In Kentucky they're separate products with different rules.

Medical payments coverage, or med-pay, is optional. It pays crash-related medical bills regardless of fault, much like PIP, and drivers often use it to cover costs beyond the $10,000 BRB limit or a PIP deductible. What med-pay lacks is the statutory machinery of the Reparations Act. The 30-day payment rule, the interest penalties, and the new balance-billing protection are BRB features, not med-pay features.

Added Reparation Benefits (ARB) are a third option. This is extra PIP coverage you buy above the $10,000 floor, sold under KRS 304.39-140, usually in blocks that raise your no-fault ceiling to $50,000 or more.¹⁰ If your policy renewed on or after July 15, 2026 and you carry ARB, the higher caps and the fee-schedule rules follow that added coverage too.

When you can step outside no-fault and sue

No-fault pays your out-of-pocket loss, but it doesn't pay for pain and suffering. To pursue those against the driver who hit you, your claim has to clear the tort threshold in KRS 304.39-060: more than $1,000 in medical expenses, or a qualifying injury such as a fracture, permanent disfigurement, permanent injury, permanent loss of a bodily function, or death.⁷ A single emergency-room visit often clears the dollar figure, but the injury categories matter when the bills are low and the harm lasts.

For context, the minimum liability limits behind that tort claim are 25/50/25: $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for bodily injury, plus $25,000 for property damage (KRS 304.39-110).¹¹ PIP never pays for vehicle damage. That's a separate property claim, and if your repaired car is worth less afterward, the diminished-value rules for Kentucky cover that piece.

Practical steps after a Kentucky crash

Get the crash documented early, because your PIP claim and any later lawsuit both lean on it; the Kentucky crash-report page explains how to get your report. Open your BRB claim promptly so the 30-day clock starts. Then check one thing that now matters a lot: whether your policy was issued or renewed on or after July 15, 2026, because that fact decides whether you get the old $200 caps or the new $500 ones. If an insurer drags out a payment or a provider tries to balance-bill you after the fee-schedule change, that's the point to talk to a lawyer. You can find a Kentucky attorney here.

This is general information about Kentucky law, not legal advice about your specific situation.

Sources

1. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-020, Definitions for subtitle (basic reparation benefits). https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=48634

2. Kentucky General Assembly, House Bill 627 (2026 Regular Session, Acts Chapter 149). https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/record/26rs/hb627.html

3. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-030, Right to basic reparation benefits. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=30026

4. Kentucky Department of Insurance, No Fault Rejection/Verification (PIP). https://insurance.ky.gov/ppc/newstatic_info.aspx?static_id=24

5. Kentucky Revised Statutes 342.035, Administrative regulations and workers' compensation medical fee schedule. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=51281

6. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-210, Obligor's duty to respond to claims (overdue benefits and interest). https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=30050

7. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-060, Acceptance or rejection of partial abolition of tort liability. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=30030

8. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-220, Fees of claimant's attorney. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=30051

9. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-230, Limitations of actions. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=45816

10. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-140, Optional additional (added reparation) benefits. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=30043

11. Kentucky Revised Statutes 304.39-110, Required minimum tort liability insurance. https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=46758