“That’ll be $650.”
“Ok, but what if I use this coupon?”
“It’s $130, but it won’t go against your deductible.”
“Sounds good”
“So which one do you want to do?”
I get that pharmacists tend to be miserable/lonely people who make good money, probably low six figures with overtime and no real obligations, but I just don’t know how there’s ever a choice here.
Mine is the opposite. They will go into a whole song and dance about how hard they tried to get insurance to cover it, how many calls they made.
“Well how much is it if I just pay for it?”
(look at me like I have 3 heads for asking such a crazy question, spend 2 minutes furiously typing on the computer)
“$14.37”
So efficient. No slack in that system at all.
Well if you’re sure you’re going to hit the deductible either way, then it might be #1.
So your insurance company is covering none of it?
A huge part of my delight at getting our “forever” house is that I no longer give a shit about my credit score. I get this is an insanely privileged position but if and when they try this shit with me moving forward I will tell them to fuck off and feel fantastic about it.
So you somehow maxed out your deductible and out of pocket and still had to pay? Or you hadn’t hit the out of pocket max yet?
Healthcare is a really good example of the futility of rules in the absence of an effective enforcement mechanism.
Like, sure, you hit your deductible or you were really in network or that medicine is actually covered. What the fuck are you going to do about it? Absolutely nothing, other than sit on hold in perpetuity and hope you somehow talk to someone with the ability and willingness to help.
My buddy’s kid had to spend time in the NICU when she was born. Despite having top-notch insurance - he still got billed for some ridiculous amount. He’s the kind of guy though who will go nuclear and spend 100s of hours just to prove a point.
His favorite charge was $600 for some BS euphemism like “hospital services” that no one could ever tell him what it was. But they were still certain he owed it of course. Somehow he got the Washington State attorney general’s office involved. It turned out to be for about 15 minutes they had spent in an unoccupied conference room to have a consultation. Not for the consultation, just rent for the room.
A guy my wife used to work with had his first baby spend 6-9 months in the NICU, I’ve always wondered what that bill looked like, before insurance adjustments, had to be a couple million
Without fail I am thrown into a full rage before ever speaking to someone every time I call my insurance company. The automated system is infuriating.
“Please say your date of birth”
“August 28th 1985”
“You said August 5th 1973, is that correct?”
Rinse and repeat for like 5 different questions. Then when I do get a person they ask the same fucking questions. WHAT THE FUCK IS THE POINT OF ANY OF THIS BULLSHIT?!!?
But I still try to be super nice with them since I know their job sucks and they’re more likely to help ke if I treat them with respect.
The point is to piss you off so much you give up, it is very much intentional.
That’s very accurate. Unluckily for them I have the time to deal with their bullshit and I cost them like $400k a year. Such an absurdly awful system we have.
Same.
To piss us off and get us to give up.
Same.
Fuck their $400K, bastards. Sorry you’re having health problems, though.
Absolutely fuck their 400k. And thanks, but I’m good. Most of that is just maintenance meds for an autoimmune disease I’ve had since I was 12 and is currently well managed. Could always be way worse so I don’t complain other than bitching about insurance issues.
From another forum on a disease that ruins people. This is about the psychological aspects after the cure:
I still get depressed—some of the damage is done and I cannot go back in time, and I am stressed about money because I have been unemployed now for almost 5 years, denied disability, and spent about $40K out of pocket (credit cards) on my medical bills in the last two years. But two years ago, I wanted nothing more than to be rid of that stupid tumor.
She’s one of the “lucky” ones. I could post hundreds of these. If you want to get into some weird territory in medicine, it’s in diseases that are difficult to diagnose. There may only be a handful of doctors that actually know what they’re doing, but as far as insurance is concerned they’re all the same. It’s like needing the Bill Belichick of a disease and the insurance lady says, “I’m showing 2,000 Dr. Chillies in your network.”
I thought I didn’t care anymore, but after that whole credit agency breach, I froze my credit with all of the agencies. Now if I want to take advantage of some sort of new, sweet credit card bonus, I actually have to go through the trouble of unfreezing my credit. Which isn’t hard but I have to look up how to do it and it takes about an hour to figure out exactly what to do. So I don’t bother any more. I guess if there was something ridiculous like that chase sapphire deal from several yrs ago, I’d probably be arsed up to do it. If my credit was too fucked up to do it, I’d probably have a mild case of the sads.
Also, they can still come after you, right? Can’t they get a settlement, garnish wages, etc.
Yup, I hate that shit. We get the bill and it sucks, but ok, that’s the bill. Then like a month later, we get another bill. What the fuck is this for? Oh, it’s for the specific person who took the x-rays. But I thought we paid for that? No, we paid for the room and the service, but not the person. Fuck this.
May have said this before but mom used to work as a social worker and for a bit of time I helped her with the paperwork.
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind insurance companies would randomly reject 5-7% of our claims, just because fuck you. I mean like we would fill out the paperwork for a client with 6 dates on it, and for no good reason we would have to fight 1 date for months.
Seriously fuck insurance companies so much.
My mom had to go back into the ER this morning with severe chest pain. Thankfully, it wasn’t a heart attack. It’s a hiatal hernia, which will almost certainly require surgery. They said the pain can be as severe as a heart attack, but currently there’s no critical health threat so they sent her home and told her to follow up with her gastrointestinal doctor to get checked out and, presumably, schedule surgery.
So she can’t get in to see her GI doc until 10/30, and then they’ll have to schedule the endoscopy, after which they can schedule the surgery. So presumably we’re looking at over a month before her surgery…
So I just wanted to say thank God and Republicans that we don’t live in a country where people have to live with severe pain while they wait weeks for urgent medical services because of evil socialism.
But hey I’m sure her 4-6 week wait doesn’t count because herp derp bullshilt reasons freedom blah blah God country family capitalism set off some goddamn red white and blue fireworks yippee ki yay motherfucker MURICA!