Opioid victims with approved claims in the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy learned their award amounts from the Purdue Personal Injury Trust in September 2026: $16,294 for a Tier 1 claim, $8,147 for Tier 2 and $25,653 for a neonatal abstinence syndrome claim, before attorney fees and medical liens. The trust has begun paying on a rolling basis and expects most approved claimants to receive at least part of their award by the end of 2026. The claim deadline passed in July 2025, so nothing can be filed now.
What the Trust Announced
The Purdue Personal Injury Trust, the fund created under Purdue Pharma's confirmed bankruptcy plan to pay individual opioid victims, posted a claims processing update dated September 30, 2026. It is the first time the trust has published dollar figures for individual claimants. Until now the only numbers in circulation were estimates from lawyers and advocates.The trust says the awards for every category of approved claim have now been computed. A Non-NAS Tier 1 claim is worth $16,294, a Non-NAS Tier 2 claim $8,147, and a neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) claim $25,653. Those are initial distributions. Payments have started, claimants are being paid on a rolling basis, and the trust expects most claimants whose claims are already Qualified and Allowed to receive some portion of their award before the end of 2026.
The plan itself took effect on May 1, 2026, and the trust was funded the same day. The civil settlement with the Sackler family carries no admission of liability, and no court has found any Sackler family member liable for the harms alleged. Purdue itself pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges in 2020 and was sentenced in April 2026. Background on how the $7.4 billion plan was rebuilt after the Supreme Court struck down its predecessor is on our Purdue Pharma and Sackler settlement page.
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What the Three Tiers Mean
The trust distribution procedures sort personal injury claims into three groups, and the claim form filed in 2025 required each claimant to pick one.| Claim category | What it required | Initial award |
|---|---|---|
| Non-NAS Tier 1 | Evidence of prescribed use of a qualifying Purdue opioid for six months (180 days) or more before September 15, 2019 | $16,294 |
| Non-NAS Tier 2 | Evidence of prescribed use of a qualifying Purdue opioid for less than six months before September 15, 2019 | $8,147 |
| NAS | A licensed provider's diagnosis of a medical, physical, cognitive or emotional condition in a child resulting from opioid exposure before birth | $25,653 |
A Tier 2 award is exactly half of Tier 1, which reflects how the procedures weight duration of use. The tier is fixed by the evidence that was submitted with the claim form, and the window to add evidence closed with the deficiency process.
What Comes Out Before the Money Arrives
The announced figures are net of some costs and gross of others, and the difference matters for anyone budgeting around a number they saw in a law firm email.Already deducted, according to the trust, are the trust's own operating expenses (including claims and lien resolution costs), certain professional fees provided for under the plan, and other plan assessments. So $16,294 is what the trust has allocated to a Tier 1 claimant after the cost of running the trust.
Not yet deducted are the claimant's own attorney's fees and case costs, and any medical liens. A lien is a reimbursement claim by a health insurer or a government program such as Medicare or Medicaid for treatment it paid for that relates to the injury claimed. The trust has hired a lien resolution administrator, Med Lien Solutions, to check every claimant against Medicaid, Medicare and other government programs, and against the large private insurers that participate in lien resolution programs, and to negotiate any reimbursement down. Claimants are told not to contact their insurers themselves, because that can create duplicate files and slow the process.
Not everyone has a lien, and a claimant with no recoverable reimbursement claim is paid without reduction. But because the review takes time, the trust is using a lien holdback: a claimant who has not yet cleared lien resolution receives part of the award now, with a portion set aside to cover potential liens. The holdback is an estimate, not a finding that the claimant owes that amount, and whatever is not needed to pay a lien is released to the claimant once the review is done. A claimant who has already cleared lien resolution is paid the full award, less fees and any liens that were found.
Status Letters, Deficient Claims and the 20-Day Appeal
The trust is sending status letters on a rolling basis as it finishes deficiency reviews. A letter says whether the claim is Qualified and Allowed, and therefore entitled to payment, or Deficient. Represented claimants get the letter through their lawyer; claimants without a lawyer get it directly.The trust describes three groups that account for most of the current Deficient findings: claimants whose objections were withdrawn or reinstated; claimants who submitted some evidence with their original proof of claim through Kroll, the bankruptcy claims agent, but never filed the separate trust claim form the plan required; and claimants whose evidence does not meet the requirements of the distribution procedures.
Either kind of status letter starts a 20-day appeal window. The trustee has appointed Ken Simon as Appeals Special Master to decide every appeal, and his decisions are final and binding, with no further appeal under the procedures. The trust's claim pages also describe a mandatory $500 fee for a denied claimant who appeals. The bankruptcy court has separately ordered a review of information submitted by claimants whose claims were the subject of the debtors' omnibus objection to unsubstantiated claims, and the trustee is working through those submissions as well.
Who Is Still Waiting
Two groups will not see money on the end-of-2026 timeline.The first is claimants whose claims are Qualified but who did not grant the third-party release when they voted on the plan. The plan calls these Qualified and Non-Participating claims, and it bars any payment on them until 18 months after the effective date, which puts the earliest possible date in November 2027. That was the trade built into the rebuilt plan: claimants who kept their right to sue Sackler family members directly gave up the faster, larger distribution.
The second is anyone whose claim is still in deficiency review or on appeal. The trust has not said when those reviews will finish, and the deadline for filing a claim in the first place, July 28, 2025, has long passed. A short discretionary late period for extraordinary cause has also closed.
A Possible Second Payment
The trust is explicit that the figures above are initial distributions. Once every contingency is resolved, the trustee will decide whether a second payment is possible, based on how many claims were ultimately allowed, how the outstanding contingencies were resolved, and how much remains in the trust after its administrative obligations. Sackler family payments under the plan are spread over several years, which is one reason the trust cannot yet say whether or how much more it will distribute. Nobody should count on a second payment until the trust announces one.How Payment Reaches You, and What to Be Careful Of
Claimants with a lawyer will get payment information from the law firm, which receives the funds and distributes them after fees, costs and any liens. Claimants without a lawyer will get an email from the trust administrator to the address on file, asking them to confirm a physical mailing address before a check goes out.That second step is worth pausing on. A message asking a settlement claimant to confirm personal details is exactly what a phishing attempt looks like, and this is a high-profile settlement with money visibly moving. Before responding, check the sender against the official trust website, purduepitrust.com, and never pay a fee, buy a gift card or share banking passwords to "release" a payment. No legitimate part of this process asks for any of that.
Questions
How much is a Purdue Tier 2 claim worth?
The Purdue Personal Injury Trust has set the initial award for a Qualified and Allowed Non-NAS Tier 2 claim at $8,147. Tier 2 covers people who documented less than six months of prescribed use of a qualifying Purdue opioid before September 15, 2019. The figure is before the claimant's own attorney's fees and costs and before any medical liens, so the amount that arrives will usually be lower.
Why is my award less than the amount the trust announced?
The announced figures already reflect the trust's operating expenses and certain plan-level professional fees, but they are stated before the claimant's own attorney's fees and costs and before medical liens. Health insurers, Medicare and Medicaid may be entitled to reimbursement for treatment they paid for, and the trust holds back part of the award until that review is done. Any holdback not needed to pay a lien is released to the claimant afterward.
When will I get my Purdue settlement money?
The trust says it has begun paying Qualified and Allowed claimants on a rolling basis and expects most of them to receive at least part of their award by the end of 2026. Represented claimants are paid through their law firm. Claimants without a lawyer receive an email from the trust administrator confirming their mailing address first. Claimants who did not grant the third-party release cannot be paid until at least 18 months after the May 1, 2026 effective date.
What if my Purdue claim was found deficient?
A status letter that says a claim is Deficient starts a 20-day appeal window under the trust distribution procedures. Appeals go to an Appeals Special Master, whose decision is final. The trust's claim pages describe a mandatory $500 fee for a denied claimant who appeals. The most common reasons the trust cites for a deficient finding are an objection that was withdrawn or reinstated, evidence filed only with the original proof of claim but no trust claim form, and evidence that does not meet the procedures' requirements.
Can I still file a claim with the Purdue Personal Injury Trust?
No. The deadline was July 28, 2025 at 11:59 p.m. Eastern, and a short discretionary late period that followed has also closed. A claim submitted now is not a Qualified Claim under the trust procedures. Anyone offering to file a new Purdue claim for you today is not describing a real process.
Sources
• Purdue Personal Injury Trust — Claims Processing Update as of September 30, 2026• Purdue PI Trust — Non-NAS PI claims, tier definitions and qualifying opioids
• Purdue PI Trust — NAS PI claims and appeal rights
• Purdue PI Trust — lien resolution and holdback FAQs
• Kroll Restructuring Administration — In re Purdue Pharma L.P., No. 19-23649 (Bankr. S.D.N.Y.) docket
• Notice of Deadline for Personal Injury Claimants and claim form packet dated May 29, 2025, reviewed by OpenClassActions.com
• Law firm claim status correspondence shared by a claimant and reviewed by OpenClassActions.com, September 2026
