SafeRide Health in Texas: How to Join for Medicaid Plan Rides (2027)

SafeRide Health is based in San Antonio, and it works for Texas Medicaid health plans, not for the state. It began with Superior HealthPlan on June 1, 2021 and has added Texas plans one at a time since. On September 30, 2026 it books rides for six of them. Whether SafeRide has trips for you depends on which of those plans cover your counties.

Which Texas plans send their rides through SafeRide

As of September 30, 2026, the state’s ride vendor list names SafeRide for these six plans.

Health plan	With SafeRide since	Programs	Member ride line
Superior HealthPlan	June 1, 2021	STAR, STAR Health, STAR Kids, STAR+PLUS	855-932-2318, and 855-932-2319 for Where’s My Ride
Driscoll Health Plan	March 1, 2022	STAR, STAR Kids	833-694-5881
Community First Health Plans	April 1, 2025	STAR, STAR Kids, STAR+PLUS	855-932-2335
Texas Children’s Health Plan	December 15, 2025	STAR, STAR Kids	888-583-0110
UnitedHealthcare Community Plan of Texas	January 1, 2026	STAR, STAR Kids, STAR+PLUS	888-462-6050
Molina Healthcare of Texas	April 1, 2026	STAR, STAR+PLUS	866-462-4857

Four of the six arrived between April 2025 and April 2026. Community First and Texas Children’s came from MTM, Molina came from Access2Care, which MTM owns, and UnitedHealthcare came from ModivCare. Our UnitedHealthcare switch report covers that plan’s move in detail. The plan pages for Superior, Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare, and Molina cover each benefit from the member side.

Superior is the one statewide piece. It runs STAR Health, the Medicaid plan for children in foster care, in every county, so SafeRide books those children’s rides wherever they live. Superior’s own page says CHIP and CHIP Perinate members are not part of its ride program.

HHSC’s preliminary count for May 2026 put about 2.2 million Medicaid members in these six plans, against about 1.3 million in the eight plans MTM serves from October 1, 2026. Superior alone had about 868,000.

Where SafeRide has the trips, service area by service area

Texas splits its counties into 13 managed care service areas. The table shows which plans use SafeRide in each area, by HHSC’s map of the plans serving each area in September 2026. “Every plan” means no other vendor has members in that program there.

Service area	STAR	STAR Kids	STAR+PLUS
Bexar	Community First, Superior	Every plan: Community First, Superior	Every plan: Community First, Molina, UnitedHealthcare
Dallas	Molina	None	Every plan: Molina, Superior, UnitedHealthcare
El Paso	Molina, Superior	Superior	Molina
Harris	Molina, Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare	Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare	Molina, UnitedHealthcare
Hidalgo	Every plan: Driscoll, Molina, Superior, UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Driscoll, Superior, UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Molina, Superior, UnitedHealthcare
Jefferson	Molina, Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare	Molina
Lubbock	Superior	Superior	Superior
MRSA Central	Superior	UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Superior, UnitedHealthcare
MRSA Northeast	Superior	Every plan: Texas Children’s, UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Molina, UnitedHealthcare
MRSA West	Superior	Superior	Superior
Nueces	Every plan: Driscoll, Superior, UnitedHealthcare	Every plan: Driscoll, Superior	Superior
Tarrant	None	None	Every plan: Molina, UnitedHealthcare
Travis	Superior	Superior	Every plan: Superior, UnitedHealthcare

The Hidalgo area (Cameron, Duval, Hidalgo, Jim Hogg, Maverick, McMullen, Starr, Webb, Willacy, and Zapata counties) is the clearest case: every Medicaid plan there uses SafeRide. Tarrant is the opposite for STAR and STAR Kids, where all the plans use MTM. Where the table shows a mix, you need both vendors to reach every member; see MTM Health in Texas.

Some plans also book extra rides through SafeRide that Medicaid does not cover. In the Harris area, UnitedHealthcare gives STAR members four round trips for non-Medicaid health needs, such as grocery, housing, or utility visits, booked with SafeRide, and riders 17 and younger travel with an adult. Texas Children’s says SafeRide runs its extra benefit rides as well as its covered ones.

How to join SafeRide for Texas trips

1. Enroll in Texas Medicaid through TMHP. SafeRide’s form lets you apply while a Medicaid application is still in process, but the state handbook bars a plan or its vendor from signing an agreement with you until TMHP has enrolled you. Apply in TMHP’s PEMS portal, and see the Texas guide for timing.
2. Fill out SafeRide’s signup form. It needs a real NPI and your EIN, your liability limits, and every county you will serve. An application left unfinished for 30 days starts over.
3. Send your credentialing files. Our SafeRide Health guide has SafeRide’s company, vehicle, and driver checklist and its driver app setup. The broker credentialing guide shows how to keep a file ready.

Texas plans add the state’s own rules on top of SafeRide’s list: drivers 18 or older with no DWI in the seven years before hire, training within 30 days of hire, and company lettering at least six inches high on every van. The Texas guide has the full driver, vehicle, and timing rules.

Which insurance limits apply in Texas

SafeRide’s published minimums and the state handbook do not match:

Coverage	SafeRide’s minimum, September 2026	Texas NEMT Services Handbook
Auto liability	$500,000	$750,000 combined single limit, for owned, hired, and non-owned vehicles
General liability	$1 million per occurrence, $2 million aggregate	The same
Workers’ compensation	Not on SafeRide’s list	Statutory limits, with $1 million employer’s liability
Certificate	SafeRide as additional insured	The State of Texas as additional insured, a term written mainly for plans and vendors, so ask whether it applies to you

The handbook tells plans and their vendors to make sure every transportation company carries the section 5300 coverage. So the plain answer is to buy the Texas limits, not SafeRide’s lower auto number, and to ask your network vendor manager to put your Texas insurance terms in writing before you sign.

What the state audit of SafeRide found

On September 4, 2025, the Texas HHS Office of Inspector General published audit AUD-26-002 of SafeRide’s rides for Superior’s STAR+PLUS members from September 1, 2022 through August 31, 2023. The audit covered the Bexar, Dallas, Hidalgo, Lubbock, MRSA Central, MRSA West, and Nueces areas. Its findings bear directly on how Texas providers get paid:

• Extra pay outside the contract. On 31,149 of 379,920 trips, SafeRide paid providers their contracted rate plus a “cost override,” which it said it paid as incentives for reasons such as long waits or long one-way trips. The overrides ranged from $0.01 to $1,510.36 and averaged $16.29, with no record of how they were negotiated. The state counted all $507,536.73 as overpayments, because a Texas ride vendor may not pay more than contracted rates.
• A $999.99 placeholder. SafeRide’s billing system defaulted seven provider trips to a placeholder amount of $999.99.
• Long trips without approval. Superior’s contract requires its written prior authorization for any trip with a continuous stretch over 75 miles, and 38 of 58 tested trips did not have one.
• Rides marked complete that members disputed. In 13 of 30 tested complaints, the member said no ride came, the driver had marked the trip complete, and SafeRide paid the claim without the fraud review its own policy called for.

The audit said SafeRide should repay $515,890.65. In a July 21, 2026 notice, the Inspector General said it agreed to a $315,000 settlement in the third quarter of fiscal year 2026. SafeRide told the auditors it now gives each ride an estimated cost from the provider’s rate card, location, and mileage, and it planned detailed rate cards and a contract tracking tool by December 15, 2025.

For your company that means three things. Get any wait-time, long-trip, or rural pay written into your rate card, since the state treats extras paid outside a contract as overpayments. Before you accept a Superior ride with a leg over 75 miles, confirm the prior authorization is in place. And mark a ride complete only at drop-off, with times recorded on your trip log. Our report on the repayment follows the case, and billing for wait time covers the add-on side.

Trips, billing, and phone lines in Texas

Trip offers, the provider web app, and SafeRide’s performance targets work the same way in Texas as elsewhere; our SafeRide Health guide walks through them. The Texas-specific pieces:

• Billing. UnitedHealthcare’s 2026 provider manual, dated September 2, 2026, says companies contracted with SafeRide bill their rides directly to SafeRide through its transportation provider login. The state handbook gives you 95 days from the ride to file and the plan or vendor 30 days to decide.
• Texas Children’s riders. A member’s first ride, or a ride to a new place, must be booked by phone. The plan tells members the driver waits 10 minutes and picks up a return ride within an hour of the call. One approved family member or attendant may ride along, and a second if SafeRide approves it as medically needed.
• Molina riders. Molina asks members to book at least 48 hours ahead, and SafeRide takes Molina calls around the clock. For members in assisted living, Molina reminds providers that under Texas rules the facility itself must provide transportation or an escort to the nearest available medical provider.
• Minors. SafeRide posts minor consent forms for Superior, Driscoll, and Molina members aged 15 to 17 who ride without an adult. Check that the form is on file before a teen rides alone.

For	Contact
Joining the network	team@saferidehealth.com or (855) 955-7433
Current providers	Your SafeRide network vendor manager
Provider and driver sign in	app.saferidehealth.com
Superior billing department	855-932-2320
Superior mileage (ITP) department	855-932-2331
Doctors and clinics booking UnitedHealthcare rides	855-932-2332
Facilities booking UnitedHealthcare rides	855-955-7433
Texas Medicaid enrollment in PEMS	TMHP Contact Center, 800-925-9126

What to do first

1. Find your service area in the table and list the SafeRide plans with members in your counties.
2. Start TMHP enrollment with your NPI in hand. SafeRide cannot sign your Texas agreement until it is done.
3. Insure to the Texas handbook limits, including $750,000 combined single limit auto and workers’ compensation.
4. Fill out SafeRide’s form in one sitting if you can, and finish it within 30 days.
5. Ask your network vendor manager three questions: which plans need more rides in your counties, which insurance limits your Texas agreement uses, and whether every add-on you expect is on your rate card.
6. Apply to MTM Health too if your area mixes plans, starting with MTM Health in Texas.