Overpaid a doctor’s bill and spent too much time waiting for a refund?
Are you a pet owner confused by the insurance policy you purchased for your fur baby?
Do you live in a flat and feel uninformed about what the council is doing?
New Florida laws that go into effect January 1st will help you navigate these and other consumer issues.
Here’s what you need to know:
Pet insurance and wellness programs
Pet insurance will be designated as “property insurance” and face new regulations. (Try telling your pets that they are now your property and not the other way around.)
According to the new law:
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Pet insurance companies must clearly explain to their customers how decisions are made to make claims payments.
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Insurance companies must share any rules regarding required medical exams for pets.
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A pet insurance agent may not market a wellness program as pet insurance or make enrollment in a pet wellness program a prerequisite to purchasing pet insurance.
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Insurance companies may refuse to cover your pet’s pre-existing health problems – but they must prove that these conditions existed before the policy was purchased.
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Waiting periods for some diseases or conditions may be set by the insurer, but not for accidents.
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A pet insurance applicant or policyholder can review the policy and cancel within 30 days if they are “not satisfied for any reason.” You are entitled to a refund during this grace period.
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After purchasing a policy, the insurer may require a pet exam, but cannot require one to renew your policy.
Does Florida’s new 2026 pet insurance law have enough teeth to protect the consumer? This cat seems skeptical. Don’t they always? Read on.
Animal Cruelty Database
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is authorized to put on its website the names of people who have been found guilty or pleaded guilty or no contest to animal cruelty because of this new law.
It’s called Dexter’s Law, for a 2024 case in which a man was charged with animal cruelty after he adopted a “sweet-tempered” shelter dog from the Pinellas County Animal Shelter named Dexter and brutally beheaded the animal days after adoption. The dog’s mutilated body was found in a plastic bag in Fort De Soto Park near St. Petersburg.
The animal cruelty case led to tougher penalties that took effect on July 1, 2025. The addition, effective Jan. 1, creates the FDLE’s publicly accessible registry of animal abusers to prevent future atrocities by tracking down offenders.
Pet adoption services or individuals offering an animal for adoption are encouraged to search the list to select potential adopters.
Refunds of overpayments
See that $409.86 hospital bill a patient owes after insurance has settled the end? If the patient mistakenly paid twice or more than what was owed for a mistaken bill, the doctor would have 30 days to offer a refund, according to a new Florida overpayment law that takes effect Jan. 1, 2026.
Paying the same bill twice for a medical procedure? It is easy to do. You paid online, but then a paper bill comes in the mail for the same amount and you pay it again just to be sure — or you simply forgot that it was paid. Or add an extra digit to your copay by mistake?
This new law requires health care practitioners, facilities, providers, and anyone who accepts payment from insurance for services provided by health care practitioners to reimburse any overpayment made by the patient within 30 days of determining that the patient overpaid.
Failure to do so could be grounds for disciplinary action by the applicable board or the Florida Department of Health if there is no board. If the facility or provider is licensed by the Agency for Health Care Administration and fails to timely reimburse an overpayment, they may face an administrative penalty of up to $500.
The new law’s requirement to timely reimburse overpayments does not apply to overpayments made to providers by health insurers and health maintenance organizations.
Condominium associations
The Miami-Dade Marine Patrol unit navigates as search and rescue personnel search for survivors through the rubble of the Champlain Towers South Condo in Surfside, Fla., Sunday, June 27, 2021. The apartment building partially collapsed on Thursday, June 24.
On July 1, new condo safety law reform went into effect to give condo owners and associations some breathing room without gutting the core of Florida’s new condo safety regulations after the 2021 Surfside condo collapse.
MORE: Will Florida’s new condo law help ease the affordability crisis? See the changes
On Jan. 1, the new law requires a condominium association that manages 25 or more units must meet deadlines for public posting of materials related to safety regulations, including minutes of administrative meetings, videos, affidavits and other materials. These public posts must be accessible not only online, but also via a mobile device.
Breast exams
The law’s new coverage for additional breast screening and diagnosis, which goes into effect Jan. 1, means the state’s employee health insurance plans make the exams fully covered and won’t require workers to pay additional costs, such as copays or deductibles, for diagnostic breast exams or additional breast exams.