Reader question: How do I check, for an Austrian care-home contract, the deduction for actually saved services during an absence of more than three days?
A resident of an Austrian care home is absent from the facility for several days. Afterwards the previous monthly fee is billed in full. The person responsible for care wants to clarify whether a deduction is provided for actually saved services. The starting point is the specific care-home contract and not a blanket rental rule for any furnished accommodation.
Determine the specific contractual framework
§27b KSchG covers certain contracts for accommodation, care and nursing in old people’s homes, nursing homes and other designated facilities. It also contains explicit exclusions, including for admission and treatment in hospitals and inpatient medical rehabilitation facilities. [KSchG27b]
This concerns the billing for the continuing care-home place during an absence. A separate hospital bill is not examined by the same standard. A student hall contract or an ordinary tenancy agreement is not allocated to this special regime merely because the word “home” is used.
Prove the actual absence
Record the start, end and any notifications already given to the care-home operator. Which absence dates are confirmed and which were only planned at first? An earlier wish to return must not make the later actual course invisible.
§27f names services that the care-home operator saves during an absence of more than three days. [KSchG27f] This article does not apply an unexamined general rule of “everything is free from the fourth day”. Have the specific period and the treatment of individual days clarified on the basis of the contract, the actual service and the statutory framework.
Which service was actually saved?
Place the fee breakdown and any absence billing side by side. Which items still relate to accommodation held available and which are services actually not provided or saved? Ask for a comprehensible explanation why a particular item was still charged or was reduced.
The statutory reference to saved services does not confirm a complete fee exemption merely because of absence. Likewise, the note that a care-home place still exists does not yet answer whether savings occurred for other services. [KSchG27f] No allocation is made here on the basis of invented industry-standard percentages.
Fictitious case with a separate follow-up question
In the fictional case a resident was absent for more than three days. The later statement contains the same total items unchanged. She requests an explanation of how the period, actually provided services and saved services were taken into account in the bill.
The advice checks the response against the contract. A possibly continuing accommodation share is not set to zero merely because of lack of personal use. Conversely, an actually documented saving is not ignored just because the monthly bill was technically prepared unchanged at first. The example deliberately does not name any deduction amount presented as generally correct.
Organise entitled support
§27e allows the care-home resident to name a trusted person who is, in principle, also to be involved in important civil-law matters, insofar as the resident does not determine otherwise. [KSchG27e] Clarify who is asking the concrete billing question and who may act with legal authority. The contact role is not automatically equated with any power of representation.
Only the absence and billing data actually needed are used for the enquiry. Medical details are not included in the general billing file without an apparent need. Any possible fee reduction is examined on the basis of the specific case; the total payable amount is not adjusted solely on the basis of a private estimate.