We have a situation where a government entity (township) has a privately owned fire department who makes and bills EMS runs for township residents. The township has a collection agency. The fire department would provide billing information to the township who would then turn it over to a colection agency to handle. Now the fire department is asserting that it may not turn over EMT billing information to the township directly because they dont feel the township is a legitimate business associate. The fire dept. just wants to turn the information over to the collection agency directly. The township would like to receive said information. Does anyone have any thoughts on this. Thank you.

Why does the township want the information?

The township wants to know what and how much the fire dept. is being reimbursed for these calls.

Would it be possible for de-identified information to be used for this purpose?