I live in Georgia.

I need some advice. My wife and I had triplet girls last August and began seeing a pediatrian. Our insurance requires a $15 co-pay so every visit so thats $45 each time we visit the peditrician. On two of our visits, we were wrapped up in getting our kids in and out of the office and I forgot to pay for the co-pays.

Months later they are billing me a $10 bill fee charge per child per visit for not making payment at time of visit. That's $60. Many discussions about it ensued and there was also a dispute about the validity of another visit co-pay they said I owed despite only coming in for vacinations. The office manager told me that if I got my balance caught up then they would waive the late fees. So I gave in and paid the remaining $45 I owed and sent a letter with the check telling them I considered my balance paid in full about a month ago.

Well today I get a notice of collection and that I have 10 days to pay the rest of the account and they will withdraw the claim. Of course I will contact the office and ask what's going on but if they persist and do not decease, what advice do you guys have to fight this without it impacting my credit?

The late fee is a total bogus charge. I was never told of it when we signed on at this office. There were never any signs saying there would be a late fee if the co-pays weren't paid and it is NOT industry practice. My wife and I have since changed pediatricians.

Dave Jurek

First of all, when you checked out the nurse never asked for payment? That is strange. Second it is always better to talk this type of thing out. Start with the person you get on the phone, then keep going higher. Maybe to the doctor hinself. I would go inperson to try and settle things.

Contact the medical insurance company. Tell them you mare being charged the late fee and don't understand why. Ask them if you need to pay it, since it doesn't show up as a legitimate enrollee fee in your benefit program.

I have talked to those people to death. Their office manager is an unreasonable b*tch and a lot of people have left this practice because of it. I did send a letter to the doctor and I never heard from her.

I will contact Aetna one more time but I don't see what they can do since this is a peditrician fee not from the insurance.

Here again though, they have submitted this to a credit agency so I'm not sure what the best course of action is to protect my credit.

Dave

I have talked to those people to death. Their office manager is an unreasonable b*tch and a lot of people have left this practice because of it. I did send a letter to the doctor and I never heard from her.

I will contact Aetna one more time but I don't see what they can do since this is a peditrician fee not from the insurance.

Here again though, they have submitted this to a credit agency so I'm not sure what the best course of action is to protect my credit.

Dave

So let me get this straight...The office mamager told you if you caught up the balance they would wave the late fees, so you paid the balance in full then they say you still owe the late fees?

If this is correct, i would suggest a letter to them from your attorney, this usualy will straighten everything out in a hurry. Let them know you will be taking legal action for breech of contract. since in a sence they entered into a verbal contract, initiated by the office manager, when she told you she would wave the late charges when you caught up your balance...which you did.

Most states take this kind of action very seriously. Especialy when your credit gets ruined.

Talk with an attorney, the initial consultation is usualy free. worst they can tell you is you have to pay.

Dave - If it's gone to collections it's out of the DRs offices hands. Contact the collection agency and talk to their rep. Let them know you have paid the bills and provide them with the reciepts or check stubs. Let them know you have been dealing with the Dr's office mgr and they waived the late charge and you paid the amount due. Have everything laid out cronalogical and let the collection agency know the Dr's office mgr is slow in taking care of these matters. My experiences are collection agencys are only acting on the info provided by Dr's office. They don't like to get in the middle of these disputes and will contact the Dr's office and have them provide proof of the claim that you still owe them...

I played this game several times because healthnet and the hospital where my daughter was born didn't communate well. The collection agent's rep ended up being my best friend during the whole mess. They also made sure my credit report didn't get dinged...

I think part of the problem is thast most doctors use a collection service to manage their recievables. While the office manager told you she would waive the late fee, she never told them. Best bet would be to get the collection service on the phone, and have them conference call to the office manager and try to get it straightened out.

Scooby,

That is so bizarre. We have Aetna too, an literally we do not pay the copay at the time of visit, they always bill us with no other charges tacked on. Our insurance says regular yearly check ups our copay is waived. We only pay the copay on sick or other visits. We know this because of a biiling discrepency last year and we found this out. Well the doctors office took their sweet time sending our $100 credit back to us, 8 months. In short, it took a call from a personal friend who is an attroney to get our money because we threatened them with a lawsuit. Since then, it is in both of my kids files to bill us seperate. This is pathetic with these doctors and insurance comapnies that can strong arm people and they can do what they want. The problem is that you have to have the insurance or the offices don't want to talk to you. Also, when dealing with all of these people, ALWAYS get names and times of all discussions. It makes a big difference when you have all of this info and can pin point somebody.

If your health plan has a copay, two things will happen at the time of the visit, 1) when you check out, the office person will ask you for your copays. Or, 2) At check out, the office person will tell you they will send you a bill.
Sence you have already changed drs, I would now at this late date just pay whatever you need to pay and get on with your life.

I would also ask if the co-pay is per visit or per patient. In my bizarre way of thinking, even with the three kids, it is one visit, one co-pay. Maybe it's time to fire the pediatrician and explain to him/her why they have been fired. I've done it before with Dr. "Peppermint Patty". Used those exact words too......"your fired". Me thinks the Donald owes me money.

Glad you guys sympathize. I appreciate the advice given. A call to the billing office resolved the late fees but uncovered $30 worth of fees for transfering records to our new pediatrician. Can you believe it?!? That office just jabs you every way they can to make a buck. I "fired" the pediatrician in January.

Well, I'm just going to pay the $30 I SHOULD NOT have to pay just to be rid of this damn office. Its not worth any more aggravation and I'd rather put the energy into enjoying my children. At least I won on the BS bill fees.

http://www.knology.net/~davejurek/images/P4230508a.jpg

The "girls" seem to be happy. Let me guess, they are looking at your car on DVD?

Well Dave, unfortunately doctors don't have to follow 'industry standards' in all of their billing practices. My office gets your copay before you leave...and if you get out without paying it (usually staff's fault), then you get billed for the copay. As far as late fees, we don't charge them...but I don't see a problem with them, as long as you give the patient ample opportunity to pay of his/her debt.
One other thing that we don't do (that sometimes I think we should LOL) is charge a fee when you 'No-Show' without a 24 hour notice. This is fast becoming the standard in my area, with the largest group charging 30 bucks per no-show. The explanation is this...if you allot a certain amount of time for a patient (say 30 min), and that patient doesn't show, then you have lost that amount of potential billing AND you have deprived another patient of an available slot to be seen in. This is especially bad with Medicaid in our aread (thus we have stopped taking new patients with Medicaid...not to mention that Medicaid reimburses about 20% of billed charges, about half what a private insurance reimburses).
Ah well, sorry for the tangent, but it sounds like the entire problem was with your pediatrician's office manager. She should have been more effective in notifying you of your debt (prior to 'late fees') and should have been more accomodating prior to turning you into collections.
Hey, bring your kids up to see me, it would probably only be a 10 hour drive LOL. I see newborns to 100+ year olds in my practice! :)

BTW, cute babies!

Gary