Glossary
Continuation of benefits
In one sentence
Keeping a benefit running while your hearing is decided. In fee-for-service Medicaid it turns on filing before the date the change takes effect, and the state may bill you back if it wins.
Also written as Aid paid pending, Maintaining services.
What continuation of benefits actually means
If a state is stopping something you are already receiving, there is a mechanism for keeping it in place while the case is heard. The rule hangs on timing: the request has to come in before the date of action, not merely within the general filing window. Those are two different deadlines and the second one is longer, which is how people lose this without realizing there was anything to lose.
There is a trade-off attached and the regulation is blunt about it. If the hearing goes against you, the state may come after the cost of what it paid in the meantime. Whether it does is a state-by-state matter; that it may is federal.
Several states publish a shorter, specific continuation window on their own notices. Where a state does, its number is on that state's page here.
The text it comes from
This is the wording the definition rests on. Where it decides anything for you, read the section rather than our summary of it.
Filing before the change takes effect is what holds the benefit in place: "If the agency sends the 10-day or 5-day notice as required under § 431.211 or § 431.214 of this subpart, and the beneficiary requests a hearing before the date of action, the agency may not terminate or reduce services until a decision is rendered after the hearing" — subject to a narrow exception where the hearing finds the sole issue is one of federal or state law or policy.
42 CFR §431.230(a), Electronic Code of Federal Regulations, effective August 2026 · source
Losing can carry a bill. "If the agency's action is sustained by the hearing decision, the agency may institute recovery procedures against the applicant or beneficiary to recoup the cost of any services furnished the beneficiary, to the extent they were furnished solely by reason of this section."
42 CFR §431.230(b), Electronic Code of Federal Regulations, effective August 2026 · source
Where this comes from
- 42 CFR §431.230(a), Electronic Code of Federal Regulations, effective August 2026 — www.ecfr.gov/current/title-42/part-431/section-431.230
Where this comes up
American GLP is not a law firm, an insurer, a government office or a clinician, and nothing here is legal or medical advice. This page says what a published rule means by a word. Which rulebook governs you depends on your plan, and your own notice and plan documents govern your case.