X-Rays for a Sting-Ray injury?
Well, glad you didn’t go the way of the Crocodile Hunter.
Hope you get it worked out. I’m half retired now. Don’t know if I can take on the big Florida Medicaid scammners. Discovery will be a bitch. Plus I’ll have to visit the site of the injury, first class tickets, hotel - $8000.00 retainer should do it.
Medical and insurance costs are too high for individuals. Members of collectives are required to pay less, and some of the members of the medical and insurance rackets are pay far more than they’re worth. Many of them pay nothing for medical services. Who pays large parts of insurance packages for the more equal animals? So-called consumers. Customers and taxpayers.
Don’t allow the psychopaths to weld your hook to the bottom about unethical billing practices or anything else. Ignore the very concept of “self-esteem.” Many people in big corporate management have been trained to reject the fake psychology of self-esteem. That training has even been called, at times, “The Unfair Advantage” (Miller). Self-esteem an unhealthy thought that should be avoided. It’s a tool for controlling people who believe in it.
Simply do things. You are what you try to do. Be happy.
Hospital services are expensive beyond competition , so their administrations can live lavishly send their kids to private $ schools , and keep attempting OBodyMortgagers scamming.
Check to see which (all) they’ve lobbied to remain non competitive.
Are you sure it was the Hospital billing that called you?
Sounds an awful like a boiler room sign up type company and the callers get commission for each signup.
Wait for the bill, I bet it’s not $8,000. I think the caller made that number up to scare you.
I smell a con. Do not give them any personal information. Or any information at all.
The medical and insurance systems are not as generally organized as they appear to be. There are subgroups within them that are organized for getting as much as they can get for themselves, and some of those subgroups, what they can get for client groups (e.g., corporations). They are collectives of individuals, each getting as much they can for themselves.
The human population is chaotic, although there are trends. People looking for employment or anything else involved with money should realize that. It’s a healthier outlook. The job market is certainly chaos. Getting a job can be a full time job, and there are ways to go about it more efficiently.
We’d be better served by a system that would allow us to shop for insurance anywhere in the United States and even to let insurance brokers do the shopping for us. If I remember correctly, that was one thing that President Trump was aiming for. Don’t know whether or not we kept him in office long enough to get that done. I’m guessing not.
My husband partially chopped off his finger. Long story short, he received a hospital bill of some atrocious amount. We went to the hospital, spoke to a woman in billing (I think she was a manager), and it was reduced. It went from something like $18,000 to $1,800. The results of the procedure were terrible, so there was that.
All in all, no muss, no fuss. She was the person that taught me that hospitals charge whatever they think they can get away with. I asked her what the charge would be for someone coming in for gallbladder surgery. She said there was no way anyone at the hospital could quote a price. I asked if there was a ballpark figure. She said no. Basically when going to the hospital it’s like handing them a blank check if you’re paying cash.
I’m sure you can get the price knocked way down. What these medical providers are doing to cash customers is wrong wrong wrong.
A friend sliced his finger a couple of years ago and went to the emergency room. An Xray and nine stitches later his bill was $2000.
Second the medical price is set in a way that is very complicated. There is one price technically but they do various discounts depending on your insurance. That is because the insurance companies pay the participating hospital a set rate every month no matter if you get treated or not.
In some ways insurance is spreading out the costs by doing this. It is not actually a bad idea. It gives a small but steady income to the medical facility and when they do treat you your bill is lowered.
You should have told the hospital that you are a cash patient. They could have charged you then and there. You would have gotten a major price cut on your bill because you are reducing the billing work load. Mostly a bill is coded, submitted, denied, corrected, resubmitted, disputed, reworked, resubmitted.... you get the picture. A year later they get paid. Cash does away with that so they are willing usually to cut your bill by about 2/3 if not more. So next time tell them you are a cash patient and will be paying then and there.
But that is for future reference.
Now what you need to do is contact the hospital and tell them you are a cash patient and you want to negotiate your bill.
The bill will probably be cut in half if you can pay right now.
Not your best price but much less hassle and headache all around.