California SB 623 Explained: What the New Rideshare Law Means for Uber and Lyft Injury and Wrongful Death Claims

A plain-English guide from Walch Law Corporation: serving injured Californians, including all of Los Angeles, and grieving families with wrongful death claims, from our Calabasas and Beverly Hills offices for more than 50 years.

The short version: California’s new law, Senate Bill 623, changes how past medical bills from “lien-based” health care providers are valued in Uber and Lyft rideshare injury cases. It only applies to crashes on or after January 1, 2027. It does not take away your rights to sue, cap attorney fees, or limit pain and suffering as some rideshare companies had attempted.

What Is SB 623?

SB 623 (authored by Senator Thomas Umberg) was signed by Governor Newsom on June 25, 2026 and became Chapter 17 of the Statutes of 2026.

It adds a new section to the Civil Code, section 3333.9. It also updates rideshare driver background-check rules in the Public Utilities Code.

The law grew out of a negotiated compromise between the Consumer Attorneys of California and Uber. The compromise avoided two competing and potentially very expensive statewide ballot fights.

Why Did the Legislature Pass It?

Uber had pushed a ballot measure that would have reached far beyond rideshare. It targeted contingency fees, medical expense evidence and attorney-doctor referral arrangements in car-crash cases statewide.

SB 623 is much narrower. It applies only to claims involving rideshare companies and their drivers. It focuses on medical liens, attorney–provider financial ties and rideshare safety.

Supporters point to concerns about inflated medical charges. Injury lawyers point out that lien-based care is often the only way an uninsured or underinsured person gets treated at all. The final law keeps lien-based treatment legal.

Does SB 623 Apply to Your Accident?

The medical lien rules of SB 623 apply when all of these occur:

• The claim is a civil case or arbitration against a network (rideshare) company (such as Uber or Lyft), its subsidiary, or an app-based driver.
• The claim arises from an automobile accident on or after January 1, 2027.
• The injured person received treatment from a lien-based provider.

It does not apply to services, liens or contracts that arose before January 1, 2027.

The law can matter for rideshare passengers, rideshare drivers, pedestrians, cyclists and people in other vehicles, if the claim is against a covered rideshare defendant.

What Is a “Lien-Based Provider”?

It is a doctor, hospital, surgery center, imaging center or other health care provider that treats you under an agreement where payment depends on, or is expected from, the outcome of your legal claim.

It does not include care paid through health insurance, government coverage, or hospitals using California’s Hospital Lien Act.

The Core Change: The 70th Percentile Cap

For lien-based treatment, the most you can recover for a medical service generally cannot exceed the 70th percentile of FAIR Health’s billed charges (or a comparable, commercially recognized database). The comparison is for the same or similar service, in your geographic area, at the time the service was provided.

In plain terms: 70 out of every 100 comparable billed charges in your area are at or below that number.

Three more rules apply:

• You can never recover more than the provider actually billed.
• Any amount above the cap is void and unenforceable. No one may collect that excess.
• The cap is a ceiling, not a guarantee. The statute does not entitle anyone to a particular amount, and the defense may still argue that charges were unreasonable, unnecessary or unrelated to the crash.

A narrow exception

Before trial, a plaintiff may ask the court to allow more. The plaintiff must show, by clear and convincing evidence and expert testimony, that the care was exceptionally rare or highly specialized and that no reasonably comparable provider or service was available.

If the judge denies that request, the other side recovers its reasonable attorney’s fees and costs for opposing it.

What Will a Jury Hear?

Jurors may not be shown billed charges or lien amounts above the recoverable maximum. They also may not hear references to SB 623 or to the maximum itself.

Bills at or below the maximum can still be admitted.

Stricter Billing Paperwork

Medical expense damages are recoverable only with itemized bills that identify each service by procedure code, using standards such as CPT, HCPCS and ICD codes.

If the defense claims a bill is deficient, it must give written notice. The provider then has 30 days to fix, supplement or clarify the records.

Sold, Financed or Factored Liens

Some providers sell or finance their liens to third parties. Under SB 623, when that happens, the recoverable amount is limited to the total consideration paid or payable to acquire the lien. It can never exceed the 70th percentile cap.

These deals must be disclosed within 30 days after the transaction and before any settlement is distributed. An undisclosed sale cannot be asserted against the defendant, the insurer, or settlement proceeds.

Arrangements that shift the risk of non-payment to a third party count as lien assignments, no matter what they are called.

New Rules for Lawyers and Medical Providers

The law adds transparency and ethics rules. Defendants may now obtain discovery about financial relationships between lien-based providers and law firms, including referrals, ownership, investment, lending and compensation.

A provider can be asked for a sworn declaration stating whether the attorney referred the patient and roughly how many patients that attorney referred in the previous 24 months.

The law makes it unlawful for a plaintiff’s contingency-fee attorney to:

• refer a client to a provider in which the attorney or an immediate family member has a direct ownership interest;
• split fees or accept kickbacks, rebates or referral compensation tied to lien-based treatment;
• pay bonuses or incentives for referrals to lien-based providers; or
• charge an extra fee for reducing or resolving a medical lien.

Violations may lead to State Bar discipline. Providers also may not agree to reduce a lien before services are rendered.

At Walch Law, your medical care decisions belong to you and your doctors. We do not profit from your treatment, and we never have.

What SB 623 Did Not Change

SB 623 also did not adopt the broader limits in Uber’s original proposal, such as limiting past medical damages in all auto cases to a multiple of Medicare rates.

Rideshare Safety Provisions

SB 623 also changes rideshare safety rules. Rideshare companies must run criminal background checks before activating a driver’s account and once every year afterward.

The list of disqualifying offenses grows, including additional sex offenses, assault-related crimes, weapons charges and violations of protective orders within specified look-back periods.

The law also allows women passengers and women drivers to request a same-gender match without violating California’s civil rights laws.

SB 623 and Wrongful Death Claims

When a rideshare crash takes a life, the family faces grief and financial uncertainty at the same time. Here is how SB 623 fits in.

What the statute says

SB 623 does not mention “wrongful death” by name. Its text covers any civil case, claim, action or arbitration against a network company, its subsidiary or an app-based driver arising from a covered automobile accident.

So the medical expense rules can matter in a death case, if the person who died received lien-based treatment before passing. No appellate court has yet interpreted the new law, so how it is applied in death cases will develop over time.

What is likely unaffected

The new rule targets one category: past medical bills from lien-based providers. California wrongful death damages include far more, and SB 623 does not limit them:

• loss of the person’s love, society, companionship, comfort, care, affection and moral support;
• loss of financial support and household services;
• funeral and burial expenses; and
• the decedent’s own losses before death, which can be recovered in a related survival claim.

Many fatal crashes involve little or no lien-based treatment. The person may have died at the scene, been treated through a hospital or been covered by insurance. Those situations fall outside the new rule.

Time limits still matter

Under California law, wrongful death lawsuits generally still must be filed within two years of the death. Rideshare cases also involve complicated insurance layers and company defenses, so early legal help matters.

How SB 623 May Affect the Value of Your Claim

For crashes on or after January 1, 2027, the amount printed on a lien-based bill will no longer control what can be sought from a rideshare company, its driver or its insurer.

That may change settlement valuation, especially where treatment involves high-charge providers, sold liens or incomplete billing codes. Good records, proper documentation and early case building matter more than ever.

Please remember: get the medical care you need. Your health comes first, and nothing in this law should stop you from seeking needed care and treatment.

Not sure how a crash is affected? Read our guide to your rights after a rideshare crash: Uber and Lyft Passenger Accidents in Los Angeles.

Frequently Asked Questions

Injured or Grieving After a Rideshare Crash? Talk to Walch Law.

For more than 50 years, Walch Law Corporation has represented people injured in serious accidents and families who have lost loved ones. We handle Uber and Lyft injury and wrongful death cases from our offices in Calabasas and Beverly Hills, California.

Contact us for a free consultation at WalchLaw.com.

Attorney Advertising. This guide is general information based on SB 623 (Stats. 2026, ch. 17; Civ. Code § 3333.9) and is not legal advice. Every case is different, prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome, and the law may be interpreted by courts in ways not described here. Consult an attorney about your situation.