"Too bad crackers aren't covered by my health plan."
Posted on 12/29/2010 12:45:33 PM PST by jackspyder
Two erroneous $11 doctor bills stopped Jeanne White from refinancing her home.
The 49-year-old resident of Colleyville, Texas, says she was shocked to learn in October that the two medical bills, which had been turned over to a collection agency, had caused her credit score to fall to 680 from 757 — making refinancing far too expensive.
"I was told I'd have to pay $14,000 in closing costs to get a 5.5% interest rate," Ms. White says, substantially more than she would have paid with a higher credit score. When Ms. White, a retired sales manager, contacted the doctor's office, she found out the bills had been issued in error.
Otherwise well-qualified borrowers with good loan-to-value ratios and steady employment are increasingly finding it difficult to refinance because of medical billing mistakes marring their credit, say mortgage bankers and real-estate agents.
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(Excerpt) Read more at finance.yahoo.com ...
I still think that FICO should fall under RICO.
I'm willing to bet that a lack of equity in the property has more to do with this than her unpaid medical bills.
Well, if the doctor made an error in issuing the bills, perhaps he might be found financially liable for her loss in civil court?
Personally, I’d have just paid the two $11 bills and not let them go to Collections.
Watch out for the cell [hone providers as well.
I paid the last payment on my contract, and told them not to continue the contract after it expired. The clerk enterd that day as trhe end of my contract. They sent me a bill for early termination penalty fee of about $240.00. I argued with toady’s for about 6 months refusing to pay it. - It went to collection agency. I finally got hold of a supervisor at ATT and pointed out the minor fact that I had made all the payments fulfilling the contract. He had to get hold of a company lawyer, and the lawyer finally edxplained to him that if I made all the payments, I had fulfilled my end of the contract. They had to call it back from the collection agency. Idiots...
Several years ago my family was in a car accident. We had all insurances, etc for ER visitation.
Three weeks later we all get LIENS in the mail, entered in a totally different state. Because the auto insurance did not pay before 30 days were up. Infuriating. They were withdrawn a few days later, because the insurance paid, but the damage is done.
RTFA!
You can, after all, PAY disputed debts and avoid Collections and THEN work at correcting things.
She didn’t find out about the bill till she tried to refinance. I would bet she never even got a notice for collection.
Unfortunately, that can happen for people who don’t regularly check their credit reports. People can do this, ABSOLUTELY FREE, at www.annualcreditreport.com. And, because there are three different credit bureaus, a person can actually request a free credit report every four months. Vigilance is the key to avoid being suprised by these sorts of things.
"Too bad crackers aren't covered by my health plan."
Medical bills are like any other. They are a legal debt. Far too many people put them aside (no big deal), but they are legal debts and should be paid.
“Personally, I’d have just paid the two $11 bills and not let them go to Collections.”
You’re assuming the doctors office actually sent her the bills.
“Medical bills are like any other”
Having just got out of the hospital I would disagree. Yes all bills should be paid. I was talking with one doctor who wouldn’t take cash.
Seems taking cash payment opens him up for lawsuits, so he won’t take cash. Only insurance payments.
The economic side of healthcare is screwed.
Sometimes, they never send a bill and it goes straight to collections.
This is a rare instance where I think there should be regulation. There was a bill last session (not sure what happened) that basically said that PAID medical collections must be stricken from credit record and deleted entirely, since they weren’t representative of risk the same way a late credit card payment or a collection from Verizon for an unpaid cell phone bill are.
As it stands now, the debt can be paid to zero, but the very fact a collection existed and is reporting to credit (even if it says “0” in balance field) hurts the FICO score. In fact, paying it once it appears on credit has zero positive effect on FICO score, it hurts just as much unless they actually DELETE the entire item from the credit bureau reports.
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