Opinion ID: 1433442
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Heading: The MPPA Preemption Issue

Text: The Missouri Prompt Payment Act imposes statutory penalties on a health carrier that fails to pay, deny or suspend a claim within forty days, and interest of one percent per month if the health carrier has not paid the claimant on or before the forty-fifth day. Mo.Rev.Stat. §§ 376.383.5-.6. The district court awarded Plaintiffs interest for United's violations of these MPPA provisions in processing the six non-ERISA claims. However, the court denied MPPA relief on the 289 ERISA claims, concluding that these MPPA remedies are preempted by ERISA. Plaintiffs appeal that ruling, which we review de novo. Painter v. Golden Rule Ins. Co., 121 F.3d 436, 438 (8th Cir.1997), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 1074, 118 S.Ct. 1516, 140 L.Ed.2d 669 (1998). ERISA preempts state laws that conflict with its provisions or frustrate its objectives. Boggs v. Boggs, 520 U.S. 833, 841, 117 S.Ct. 1754, 138 L.Ed.2d 45 (1997). The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that any state-law cause of action that duplicates, supplements, or supplants the ERISA civil enforcement remedy conflicts with the clear congressional intent to make the ERISA remedy exclusive and is therefore pre-empted. Aetna Health Inc. v. Davila, 542 U.S. 200, 208-09, 214-16, 124 S.Ct. 2488, 159 L.Ed.2d 312 (2004); see Pilot Life Ins. Co. v. Dedeaux, 481 U.S. 41, 52-54, 107 S.Ct. 1549, 95 L.Ed.2d 39 (1987). In In re Life Ins. Co. of N. Am., 857 F.2d 1190, 1194-95 (8th Cir.1988), we held that ERISA preempts claims for penalties under the Missouri Vexatious Refusal to Pay Statute, Mo.Rev.Stat. § 375.420, explaining that  Pilot Life could not have stated with any greater clarity that the remedies afforded under ERISA are exclusive, and no state law purporting to supply additional remedies will escape the preemptive effect of [29 U.S.C.] § 1144(a). We have consistently applied this principle. See Werdehausen v. Benicorp Ins. Co., 487 F.3d 660, 669 (8th Cir. 2007) (any state law remedy is preempted by ERISA's comprehensive remedial scheme) (emphasis omitted). Plaintiffs argue that a state law obligating an ERISA plan administrator to promptly pay health care providers is not preempted because its impact on the plan is too remote. Plaintiffs rely on the decision in Baylor Univ. Med. Ctr. v. Ark. Blue Cross Blue Shield, 331 F.Supp.2d 502, 511-12 (N.D.Tex.2004), that the Texas Prompt Pay Law was not completely preempted by ERISA. We are not persuaded. Unlike the Texas statutes at issue in Baylor, the MPPA regulates health carrier payments to claimants, who are broadly defined to include ERISA participants and beneficiaries. Mo.Rev.Stat. § 376.383.1(1). Moreover, the state law claim in Baylor was based on a provider agreement, whereas Dr. Schoedinger's ERISA claims are based on patients' assignments of plan benefits. Thus, the impact of the MPPA on plan administration is not remote. Indeed, even if a provider asserts a contract right independent of his right under the patient's assignment of plan benefits, the impact of additional state law remedies on ERISA plan administration may require preemption of a state law claim based on that contract. Cf. In Home Health, Inc. v. Prudential Ins. Co. of Am., 101 F.3d 600, 606 (8th Cir.1996); Ark. Blue Cross & Blue Shield v. St. Mary's Hosp., Inc., 947 F.2d 1341, 1348-49 (8th Cir.1991). Finally, the Baylor court's analysis of complete preemption seems inconsistent with the Supreme Court's later decision in Davila, which reversed a Fifth Circuit ruling that another claim under Texas law was not preempted. For these reasons, we affirm the district court's ruling that ERISA preempts Plaintiffs' claims for MPPA remedies. We note that the district court's award of interest for wrongfully delayed ERISA benefit payments in this case was appropriate under 29 U.S.C. § 1132(a)(3)(B). Parke v. First Reliance Standard Life Ins. Co., 368 F.3d 999, 1009 (8th Cir.2004).