FIFTH DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL 

STATE OF FLORIDA

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Case No. 5D2022-1899 

LT Case No. 2020-13521-CODL 

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AUTO CLUB INSURANCE 

COMPANY OF FLORIDA, 

Appellant,

v.

EXPRESS CARE OF BELLEVIEW,

LLC a/a/o EILEEN FONTI, 

Appellee.

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Case No. 5D2022-2391 

LT Case No. 2020-16726-CODL 

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AUTO CLUB INSURANCE

COMPANY OF FLORIDA, 

Appellant,

v.

EXPRESS CARE OF BELLEVIEW, 

LLC a/a/o HELMUT J. MEVEN, 

Appellee.
2 

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On appeal from the County Court for Volusia County. 

Angela Dempsey, Judge, 

Rachel D. Myers, Judge. 

Michael A. Rosenberg, of Cole, Scott & Kissane, P.A., Plantation, 

for Appellant.

Chad A. Barr and Dalton Lee Gray, of Law Office of Chad A. 

Barr, P.A., Altamonte Springs, for Appellee.

June 28, 2024

EDWARDS, C.J.

The issue in these consolidated cases involves the amount of 

reimbursements that an insurer providing Personal Injury 

Protection (“PIP”) benefits must pay when the health care provider 

submits a bill for treating its insured which is less than the 

statutory schedule of maximum charges which the insurer utilized 

in its policy as its limit of PIP reimbursement. Summary 

judgments were entered in favor of the health care provider, 

Express Care of Belleview, LLC, based upon an earlier case from 

this Court dealing with atypical policy language. The issue has 

been settled by the Florida Supreme Court’s opinion in Allstate 

Insurance Co. v. Revival Chiropractic, LLC., 49 Fla. L. Weekly 

S113 (Fla. April 25, 2024). Based upon that decision, we reverse 

the summary judgments entered in favor of Appellee, Express 

Care of Belleview, LLC, and remand for entry of summary 

judgments in favor of Appellant, Auto Club Insurance Company of 

Florida.1

1 The parties submitted competing motions for summary 

judgment in which they agreed that there were no issues of fact 

and that the issue was purely a legal question.
3 

In our cases, Express Care treated patients who had PIP 

insurance provided by Auto Club. As is customary, the insured 

patients assigned their PIP benefits to Express Care, which then 

submitted charges for their treatment to Auto Club. The PIP 

policy provisions utilized by Auto Club adopted a statutory 

schedule of maximum charges that it would pay as its own 

schedule of maximum charges for reimbursing health care 

providers treating its insured. 

Express Care submitted charges to Auto Club for the two 

insured patients seeking payment in an amount less than the 

insurer’s maximum reimbursement rate. Consistent with section 

627.736(1)(a), Florida Statutes (2017), Auto Club reimbursed 

Express Care at the statutory rate of eighty percent of the billed 

amount. Express Care sued alleging that it was entitled to 

payment in full of its charges given that they were below the 

statutory maximum scheduled amount for services adopted by 

Auto Club.

In Revival Chiropractic the supreme court held that Florida’s 

statutory scheme for medical care provided through PIP called for 

reimbursement at the rate of eighty percent of the reasonable 

amount charged for necessary treatment limited by the statutory 

maximum benefit amount if the insurer had included that 

provision in its policy. The court held that the fact that a health 

care provider submitted a request for reimbursement at an 

amount lower than the maximum reimbursement amount did not 

entitle the provider to payment in full up to the maximum amount.

Rather, it would still receive eighty percent of the amount billed, 

up to the maximum amount. The supreme court’s detailed 

analysis is set forth fully in Revival Chiropractic and need not be 

repeated here.

The supreme court noted that one of the cases relied upon by 

courts granting summary judgments in favor of health care 

providers seeking full reimbursement for charges below the 

maximum scheduled amount came from this Court, Hands On 

Chiropractic PL v. GEICO General Insurance Co., 327 So. 3d 439 

(Fla. 5th DCA 2021). Another came from the Fourth District and 

also involved a GEICO policy. Geico Indem. Co. v. Muransky 

Chiropractic P.A., 323 So. 3d 742 (Fla. 4th DCA 2021). The 
4 

supreme court noted that the insurance policies involved in the 

just-cited cases contained provisions materially different from the 

provisions in the Allstate policy involved in the Revival 

Chiropractic case. Revival Chiropractic, 49 Fla. L. Weekly S113. 

The supreme court noted that Hands On Chiropractic and

Muransky were decided without the benefit of its later-decided 

case, MRI Associates of Tampa, Inc. v. State Farm Mutual 

Automobile Insurance Co., 334 So. 3d 577 (Fla. 2021). Id. 

Regarding those district court cases, the supreme court 

announced, “that they have been undermined to the extent that 

whatever they might have to say relevant to the issue in this case 

has been superseded by our analysis in MRI Associates.” Id. Thus, 

while controlling in their day, those two district court cases cannot 

support the summary judgments entered in favor of Express Care 

in this case, which we now reverse.

Accordingly, we reverse the summary judgments entered in 

favor of Express Care and remand for entry of summary judgments 

in favor of Auto Club.

REVERSED and REMANDED. 

MAKAR and BOATWRIGHT, JJ., concur. 

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Not final until disposition of any timely and 

authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or 

9.331. 

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