Georgia prompt pay law dental

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Under O.C.G.A. §33-24-59.5; §33-24-59.14, the Georgia payment deadline is 15 working days (electronic) and 30 calendar days (paper). Late payments owe interest at 12% per year (§33-24-59.5(c); §33-24-59.14(c)) — mandatory in terms ("shall pay") and owed to the claimant. Dental applicability: Expressly covered: Georgia's definition of "health benefit plan" includes "any dental or vision care plan or policy" (§33-24-59.5(a)(2), incorporated by §33-24-59.14(a)(4)). §33-24-59.14(a)(5) borrows "health care provider" from §33-20A-3, whose definition names "dentist" — that, not the prompt-pay section itself, is what makes a dental practice a claimant. §33-20A-3(3) excludes dentists' private offices from "facility," so a dental practice is covered as a provider, never as a facility. A self-funded private-employer (ERISA) plan is generally beyond this statute's reach and runs on the federal claims-procedure clock instead — but that comes from the courts reading 29 U.S.C. § 1144, not from its text, and it is not categorical: a self-funded governmental or church plan is not an ERISA plan at all, § 1144(b)(6) leaves multiple employer welfare arrangements open to state insurance law, and nothing in § 1144 bars a state from reaching the third-party administrator or the network contract.