UPHP Transportation in 2027: How Upper Peninsula Health Plan Rides, Mileage, and Drivers Work

Upper Peninsula Health Plan (UPHP) is the Medicaid health plan for Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, run from Marquette since 1998. It does not hand its rides to a broker. Its own Transportation Department pays members for mileage and books buses, cabs, wheelchair transport companies, and a network of volunteer drivers.

Where UPHP arranges rides

In its April 8, 2024 Medicaid health plan awards, MDHHS gave Region 1, the Upper Peninsula, to UPHP alone. Those contracts began October 1, 2024 and run five years, with three one-year options. UPHP’s 2026 provider manual puts its service area at all 15 Upper Peninsula counties, with more than 40,000 members and over 4,200 network providers.

Alger to Dickinson	Gogebic to Luce	Mackinac to Schoolcraft
Alger	Gogebic	Mackinac
Baraga	Houghton	Marquette
Chippewa	Iron	Menominee
Delta	Keweenaw	Ontonagon
Dickinson	Luce	Schoolcraft

The same ride rules cover each UPHP program:

UPHP program	Ride benefit
UPHP Medicaid	NEMT to covered care, including pharmacy trips and Medicaid dental, behavioral health, and substance use treatment visits the plan does not pay for itself
Healthy Michigan Plan	Same benefit
Children’s Special Health Care Services	Same benefit
MI Coordinated Health (HMO D-SNP), for members with Medicare and Medicaid	Same benefit. Since January 1, 2026, Chippewa, Gogebic, and Menominee counties are outside this plan’s service area.

Two groups get rides elsewhere. Medicaid members who are not in a health plan go through their local MDHHS office, as the Medicaid Provider Manual (October 1, 2026) sets out. Nursing home residents are the facility’s job: the manual makes a nursing facility arrange or provide non-ambulance rides for its Medicaid residents, dialysis trips included, and pay for them out of its daily rate. UPHP reminded facilities of that rule in a 2021 bulletin. For those rides, contract with each facility, as NEMT facility contracts explains.

How UPHP decides who drives

UPHP uses the least costly option that meets the member’s medical needs. Its volunteer packet says mileage reimbursement always comes first, for members who have a car or a friend, relative, or neighbor to drive them. A transport comes next, when the member has neither.

Ride option	Who drives	What the member needs	How it works
Mileage reimbursement	The member, or a friend, relative, or neighbor	A car or a willing driver	Paid per mile after a signed form reaches UPHP
Volunteer driver	A screened UPHP volunteer in a personal car	No car or driver, and able to get in and out of a car without help	Paid mileage, meals, and lodging. No wages.
Bus	Local public transit	Able to ride the bus	UPHP tells bus companies the Friday before the week of the ride. Marquette Area Transit Authority riders get a voucher good for that date only.
Cab	A taxi company	No car or driver	UPHP books the trip
Wheelchair transport company	A company with a lift-equipped van	A wheelchair lift, documented on UPHP’s Medical Needs Form	UPHP books the trip

Booking rules that decide your trips

• Five business days’ notice. Members request rides online or at 1-800-835-2556, weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern. As of June 2026, callers who cannot reach an agent can choose an automatic call-back. For urgent requests UPHP tries to find a ride and at least offers mileage reimbursement.
• UPHP approves every ride first. Members may not contact a volunteer driver, bus, or cab directly without UPHP’s approval. Once UPHP approves a bus ride, the member books the pickup time with the bus.
• Medical Needs Form. A treating provider documents that a member cannot use the bus, needs a wheelchair lift, needs a caregiver along, or needs routine primary care outside the community. It lasts up to one year unless the condition is permanent. It goes to UPHP by email, mail, or fax at (906) 225-7690.
• Distance limits. UPHP pays up to 80 miles round trip for routine care that is available in the member’s community.
• Trips out of the region. A referral to Lower Michigan or another state needs an approved prior authorization, requested by the referring provider. UPHP has 14 days to decide and does not backdate approvals.

What UPHP pays for mileage, meals, and lodging

UPHP reimburses at the MDHHS NEMT rate schedule and says rates can change without notice. The schedule effective July 1, 2026:

Item	MDHHS maximum (July 1, 2026)
Mileage: member, or a family member or friend who drives	$0.76 a mile
Mileage: volunteer driver or foster parent	$0.76 a mile
Mileage: commercial, nonprofit, dial-a-ride, or paratransit provider	$0.76 a mile
Wheelchair lift or Medi-Van vehicle owned by a commercial, public, or nonprofit agency	$35 a round trip plus $0.76 a mile
Medically necessary attendant	$15
Breakfast, lunch, dinner	$8.50, $8.50, $19, tax included
Lodging	$75 a night
Parking, fees, and tolls	Actual charge

Medicaid pays the lower of the maximum or the provider’s usual charge to the public. UPHP’s 2025 volunteer packet listed $0.70 a mile, the state rate that year, and $36 in meals for a full day or overnight trip.

How UPHP applies the rates:

• Member mileage runs from home to the appointment by Google Maps. Forms are due within 12 months of the appointment, and UPHP processes them within 30 days of receipt. Status shows on the UPHP Assist portal.
• Volunteer mileage runs from the driver’s address to the member’s home, to the destination, and back, rounded up to the nearest mile. Two members in one car still earn one set of miles. The form must be postmarked within 30 days of the appointment.
• Dry runs. When a member is not home and never canceled, UPHP pays the volunteer’s miles from home to the member’s home and back.
• Meals and lodging apply to appointments over 200 miles one way or 400 round trip. Meals cover the appointment day, for the member and one legal guardian, with original itemized receipts. Nothing bought with a Bridge card, and no alcohol or tobacco. UPHP can also book partner hotels in Michigan and Wisconsin.
• Mackinac Bridge tolls need original receipts, and UPHP accepts MacPass statements. Attach a statement to each reimbursement form it covers.

A company’s pay for cab or wheelchair trips is between the company and UPHP, so ask for it in writing before your first trip. The state schedule above is the benchmark UPHP uses for mileage. On long runs, empty miles decide whether a trip pays, as rural NEMT shows.

How to drive for UPHP

As a volunteer driver

1. Get the application from UPHP’s volunteer driver page, or ask UPHP to mail one.
2. Meet the basics. The 2025 packet requires drivers over 19 with a valid Michigan driver’s license, registration, and insurance, with copies sent each year.
3. Sign the packet: the policy agreement, a release, the HIPAA attestation, the NEMT attestation, and consent for a Michigan State Police criminal history and driving record search.
4. Send a photo to uphpnemt@uphp.com for your driver badge, or have UPHP take it.
5. Attend orientation, then replace any document when it expires.

UPHP calls the available driver closest to the member’s home, and you may turn down any run. After accepting, you call the member, then call again at least two days before the appointment. You carry the badge, hang UPHP’s decal in a passenger window at pickup, and never help the member in or out of the car. A driver who agrees can lift up to 40 pounds of mobility or oxygen equipment. Volunteers are not employees and have no workers’ compensation. A relative or close friend of the member cannot drive as a volunteer. They use member mileage reimbursement instead. The questionnaire also has a driver type for adult foster care (AFC) homes.

As a cab or wheelchair van company

1. Ask about the need. Call UPHP Transportation and Provider Relations and ask whether UPHP needs cab or wheelchair service in your county.
2. Meet the state’s commercial provider rules. Section 4.4 of the Medicaid Provider Manual (October 1, 2026) requires drivers 18 or older who read and communicate in English, a valid license for the vehicle class, every license and certification your service needs (including any required liability insurance), ADA compliance, and vehicles that meet the rider’s safety and medical needs. Vehicles need seat belts, child seats where state law requires them, and working heat and air conditioning.
3. Enroll in CHAMPS. The manual requires transportation providers to be enrolled in CHAMPS, Michigan’s Medicaid system, on the date of service. Taxicab carriers, public transit, members who drive themselves, family members, and foster parents are exempt. Under federal rule 42 CFR 438.602(b), the state screens and enrolls every network provider of a Medicaid health plan, and a plan may sign a provider for up to 120 days while that enrollment is pending.
4. Sign UPHP’s NEMT attestation for your agency. It covers every driver, as the table below shows.
5. Complete credentialing. UPHP’s manual says every network provider must be credentialed and sign a Provider Participation Agreement. The NEMT credentialing checklist keeps the documents together.
6. Set up payment. Send UPHP’s direct deposit form with a voided check. If your bank returns a payment, UPHP moves you back to paper checks and charges $15 per returned transaction.

UPHP attestation item	What it means for your drivers
Exclusions	Not excluded from any federal health care program, and not on the MDHHS sanctioned provider list or the HHS OIG exclusion list
License	A valid driver’s license
Drug felonies	No federal or state felony conviction after August 21, 1996 for making, distributing, prescribing, or dispensing a controlled substance
Disclosure	Report any drug felony, and disclose driving history and traffic violations
Driving record	Excluded after more than two moving violations, an OWI, or a DUI in the past two years

Check each driver against the OIG exclusion list before the first ride. The taxi company guide covers Medicaid work for cab companies, and contracting with Medicaid health plans covers plan contracts in general.

Rules on every UPHP trip

UPHP’s 2026 NEMT rules and its NEMT FAQ set these for members and every driver:

• Minors. A parent or guardian rides with members under 18. MDHHS notes that UPHP does not provide car seats.
• No side trips. Drivers may not take members shopping or on errands, lend them money, or lift their belongings.
• Sedation. Bus, cab, and volunteer drivers cannot sign a member out after a procedure. The member brings someone who can watch them for 24 hours.
• Weather. If a driver cancels because of weather, UPHP will not find another driver. It offers the member mileage if the member finds a ride.
• Safety. A driver may refuse future rides for a member who uses drugs or alcohol, carries a weapon, or makes the driver fear for their safety.

The volunteer policy adds rules worth copying into any company’s driver handbook:

• No extra stops without UPHP’s approval, even when a clinic asks the driver to take the member somewhere else.
• Incidents. Call 911 after an accident, then report it to UPHP right away. Report every dry run.
• Privacy. UPHP is a HIPAA covered entity. Keep trip forms secure and never contact a member or family through social media. See HIPAA for NEMT.

Who to call

For	Contact
Ride requests and transportation questions	UPHP Transportation, 1-800-835-2556 (TTY 711), weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern. An answering machine takes messages 24 hours a day.
Driver reports under the attestation	UPHP Transportation, 1-906-225-7085
Contracts and credentialing	Provider Relations, 1-800-835-2556 (Medicaid) or 1-877-349-9324 (Medicare), fax 906-225-1087
Medical Needs Forms	customerservice@uphp.com, or fax (906) 225-7690
Volunteer badge photos	uphpnemt@uphp.com
Payments and claim status	UPHP Assist portal, assist.uphp.com
Mail	UPHP, Attention: Transportation, 853 West Washington Street, Marquette, MI 49855

Before you call Provider Relations, have your CHAMPS enrollment or application, NPI, W-9, insurance certificate, vehicle list with lift vans marked, and the counties you cover. The Michigan guide covers the state’s other health plans and their brokers.