Speak Up: HHS Wants Input on Easier Privacy Complaint Forms
Published Date: 12/31/2025
Notice
Summary
The Department of Health and Human Services wants your thoughts on updating two important complaint forms about civil rights and health info privacy. If you or your organization deal with these issues, this is your chance to speak up before March 2, 2026. The update aims to make the forms clearer and easier to use, with no new costs involved.
Analyzed Economic Effects
3 provisions identified: 1 benefits, 1 costs, 1 mixed.
OCR complaint forms simplified
HHS/OCR proposes revisions to two complaint forms — the "Civil Rights and Conscience Complaint" and the "Health Information Privacy, Security, and Breach Notification Complaint" — that will omit certain questions to reduce burden, clarify terms, and update statutory and regulatory references. The agency says these changes are intended to make the forms clearer and easier to use for individuals, households, and not-for-profit institutions that file complaints.
Forms conformed to recent legal guidance
OCR will update the complaint forms to conform to Executive Order 14168 and to the court order in Texas v. Becerra (E.D. Tex. Aug. 30, 2024), which stayed the Section 1557 Final Rule definition of sex discrimination that included terms like "sex characteristics," "sexual orientation," and "gender identity." The forms also will update statutory and regulatory authorities referenced on the forms.
Time burden and projected complaint volumes
OCR estimates completing either complaint form takes 0.75 hours (45 minutes) per response and uses a wage rate of $22.43 per hour. OCR projects annual complaint volumes of 15,468 civil-rights complaints and 31,985 privacy-related complaints (47,453 total), yielding 11,601 hours and 23,989 hours respectively, and 35,590 total annual burden hours.
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Key Dates
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