California Language Assistance Program
California Senate Bill 853, The Health Care Language Assistance Act, requires health plans to provide language assistance program services to eligible customers with limited English proficiency.
To support this requirement, American Fidelity developed a California Language Assistance Program (CA LAP) for eligible American Fidelity customers, including those covered by our individual or group health insurance policies that provide coverage for hospital, medical, or surgical benefits. Through this program, we offer free interpreter services.
Who is eligible for CA LAP services?
All American Fidelity customers who live in California are eligible, regardless of the American Fidelity product.
If you are an American Fidelity health plan customer and have difficulty understanding English, we offer language assistance and interpreter services at no extra cost to you.
How can California customers obtain American Fidelity’s free interpreter services?
Limited English-proficient patients with American Fidelity plans who live in California can obtain free telephonic interpreter services, in any language, by calling the phone number listed on the language assistance notice.
- For free telephonic interpreter services, call the American Fidelity toll-free number: 1-800-662-1113
- American Fidelity discourages the use of family and friends, especially minors, as interpreters.
Requirements for American Fidelity
- Inform customers that interpreter and translation services are available free of charge in 15 non-English languages by providing a language assistance notice.
- Offer verbal interpretation services in any language at all American Fidelity and health care provider points of contact.
- Discourage use of family and friends, especially minors, as interpreters.
- Use qualified interpreters and bilingual staff who have been tested for proficiency and are knowledgeable about health care benefit terminology in non-English languages.
- Provide cultural competency and CA LAP procedural training for all American Fidelity staff that routinely interact with CA LAP-eligible customers.
- Collect and store American Fidelity customers’ race and ethnicity information, as well as their preferred spoken and written languages, in a secure database to ensure confidentiality.
- Assess customer demographics at least every three years to identify threshold languages.
- Keep a record of a customer’s refusal of interpreter services.
- Document, track, and trend CA LAP complaints.
- Monitor CA LAP compliance.
Filing grievances
If you believe that American Fidelity has failed to provide these services or discriminated in another way on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, disability, or sex, you can file a grievance by sending an email to accountservices@americanfidelity.com or by writing to the following address:
P.O. Box 25523
Oklahoma City, OK 73124
If you need assistance filing a written grievance, please call 800-662-1113 (TTY: 711) or send an email to accountservices@americanfidelity.com.
You can also file a civil rights complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights electronically through the Office for Civil Rights Complaint Portal, available at https://ocrportal.hhs.gov/ocr/portal/lobby.jsf, or by mail or phone at:
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, SW
Room 509F, HHH Building
Washington, D.C. 20201
1-800-368-1019, or 1-800-537-7697 (TDD)
Complaint forms are available at http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/office/file/index.html.