FRI AM News: Medical groups back barring insurance companies from requiring virtual card payment; JCRAR hears comments on bills that would change rulemaking process

October 10, 2025

— Medical groups have registered in favor of a bill that would bar health insurance companies from requiring providers to accept virtual credit card payments.

AB351 author Rep. Clint Moses, R-Menomonie, said the measure would help health care providers avoid getting stuck with an extra fee they then have to pass on to customers.

“Many cases, the only way we can recoup that money is by billing our private payers more, if we can under contract, or self payers,” the chiropractor said. “And in my industry, same with the dental industry, there’s still a fair number of patients that either have high deductible insurance or no insurance, where they’re having to pay us.”

The bill wouldn’t prohibit health care providers from accepting virtual credit card payments, if that’s what they prefer. But insurance companies would have to make any extra associated costs clear in contracts with providers.

Patrick Teepee, a dentist and legislative advocacy chair of the Wisconsin Dental Association, likened virtual credit card payment requirements to automatic paycheck deductions.

“What if, for your next paycheck, instead of getting your pay deposited to your checking account … you get a fax or a secure email with a string of credit card numbers and a pin that requires you to go online to get paid,” he said. “You didn’t ask to get paid this way, but yet, that’s how it came. When you go to that online portal to get your pay, you learn that there is a 5% service charge deducted from your paycheck. That’s just not right, in our opinion.”

Watch yesterday’s hearing.

See the bill.

— GOP state Rep. Adam Neylon today urged lawmakers to back legislation that would require lawmakers to reauthorize chapters in the administrative code every seven years, saying it would “make JCRAR great again.”

Neylon, R-Pewaukee, testified alongside GOP Sen. Steve Nass, his fellow co-chair of the Joint Committee for Review of Administrative Rules. He argued to a joint legislative hearing that the proposal was needed to reestablish the Legislature’s role in the administrative rules process.

SB 277/AB 274 was introduced in May, before the state Supreme Court ruled JCRAR no longer had the power to indefinitely suspend agency proposals.

Rep. Mike Bare, D-Verona, pointed to that decision as he questioned whether the proposal would withstand court scrutiny.

The bill would require JCRAR to create a schedule for the expiration of all existing code chapters. The year before a chapter was to expire, the agency would have to send JCRAR and the appropriate standing committee a notice of the intent to readopt the chapter.

If no committee members object, the chapter would be readopted without further action.

But if one did, the agency would have to promulgate a rule to readopt the chapter through the standard process.

“I think you’re making it unconstitutional again,” Bare said.

The court’s ruling has left the GOP-controlled Legislature without a meaningful way to halt administrative rules proposed by the Evers administration. Lawmakers would now have to pass legislation that Gov. Tony Evers would sign to stop rules proposed by his administration.

Nass and Neylon said they are working on an amendment that would try to ensure the proposal is constitutional under the court’s July ruling.

Neylon argued the administrative rules process was meant to have legislative oversight. Otherwise, state agencies have the power to create rules and administrate them with no oversight. He said lawmakers should be the ones creating public policy, rather than a “system that allows for everything to come from one place.”

“This is one way we thought we could do that to bring some sanity back to this process,” Neylon said.

The other bills the joint hearing took testimony on include:

SB 276/AB 275, which would require a court that rules an administrative rule to be invalid to award reasonable attorney fees and costs to the party that challenged the regulation.
SB 275/AB 276, which would make changes to the frameworks agencies put together on proposed rules. Known as scope statements, they now expire after 30 months. Agencies then can’t promulgate any rule based on that statement of scope that hasn’t been submitted for legislative review. The bill would set that as six months for emergency rules, which are temporary regulations that can only be extended with legislative approval. The bill would make other changes, such as limiting an agency to one rule per scope statement.
SB 289/AB 277, which would change state law that add steps for regulations that are expected to pass along $10 million or more in implementation costs to businesses, local governments or individuals over a two-year period. Now, agencies must stop working on such proposals until they modify the rule to reduce the expected cost or a bill is enacted to allow the rule to proceed. The bill would change that threshold to any proposed rule that’s reasonably expected to pass along any amount of implementation and compliance costs to businesses, local governments and individuals over any two-year period.

— The Natural Resources Board plans to meet later this month with items on its calendar relating to air pollution control construction permit applications and exemption requests, modifications to hazardous waste regulations and more.

The board is set to meet in person for proposed rulemaking documents at 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 22 at the State Natural Resources Building, GEF 2, in Madison.

The deadline to register for public comment is 11 a.m. on Oct. 15.

See the notice and items on the calendar here.

— Pellitteri Waste Systems and the National Fire Protection Association are warning people to understand the fire risks associated with lithium ion batteries.

As part of their effort to promote Fire Prevention Week, the two made a list of four recommendations to follow to reduce the risk of fire at home and during disposal. Pellitteri President David Pellitteri said several area recycling centers in recent years have experienced “catastrophic” damage from fires believed to have been caused by lithium ion batteries.

“Recycling Centers are particularly sensitive to fires because of the amount of paper and cardboard being recycled there,” he said. “Each one of these fires has the potential to not just knock out local infrastructure, but also to threaten the lives of our workers, which is why proper disposal of batteries is so important.”

See the list of recommendations here.

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