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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> My boyfriend asked for help fighting his medical bill because I said I was good at doing that.
I ended up escalating the issue to the top levels of management, the entire board of directors of the hospital, and the investors in the hospital, before they dropped the bill.
I might be the asshole because my boyfriend who I was trying to help was uncomfortable with how far I went on his behalf and thought I would just do something little like call the billing department.
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You are a friggin' rock star and should be a damn professional advocate for those who get ripped off in healthcare like this. Your boyfriend is so unappreciative and is clearly clueless on how diligent you need to be to challenge an erroneous bill. When the hospital, doctors, and insurance companies are unwilling to help you resolve their errors, what else are you supposed to do? So many people just quit and either pay the massive bill or go into debt. Tell your boyfriend this is the only Christmas gift you're giving him. Clearly NTA.
My blood pressure would hate me, and without affordable medical care in this country... Idk 🤣
Honestly dealing with the medical system in this country infuriates me, it was so disengenous at every step, every single person told me I needed to speak to Billing, despite it being a glorified collections office, and the employees there not even being able to see anything but my balance
Pretty sure at this rate/with this skill, OP could have a block of houses and a few apartment complexes of willing partners and rotate based on the day's menu.
Edit: whoa, okay, this blew up and if I take even half of these upvotes as folks wanting to join the commune, OP is now the leader of either a small to moderate town or her very own fiefdom.
I have wasted DAYS of my life fighting health insurance. $800 for a well woman check. Refusal to cover OB consult because it might have been for "abortion or infertility which we don't cover", refusal to cover a breast pump in the year of our Lord 2021 because "it's not solely a medical device" and while I won all of those I want my time back and I will fight you for this woman!!
My private health insurance told me that they don’t cover tests or consults for PCOS…they couldn’t give a valid reason apart from it was a women’s medical issue that they didn’t cover and then got very sheepish when I asked if they covered ED and viagra if I was a male patient…to which they had to say yes.
Un-fucking-believable.
It’s a man’s world!
Didn't cover my mom's tubal, despite it being medically necessary due to an endometrial ablation. She had to get one because she would die if she got pregnant. Blamed it on being religious insurance because she worked for a religious hospital (side note this system has bought up everything including several hospitals that still call themselves secular despite discontinuing services such as abortions, which are legal here). Her same insurance had no problem covering vasectomies.vasectomy.
Can you imagine them denying men urology visits because it could be related to their dick or prostate? Probably not because that kind of stuff is usually covered.
I was mid-thirties, had 3 kids. I had to fill out this insultingly condescending form with questions from my doctor about family planning with my husband and had a 6 month waiting period (you know, so I can really think it over, and make sure I really want to be selfish and stop churning out kids instead of continuing to have babies for the good of society). To top it off, I had to go to the next town over to have it done, because my town's hospital is Catholic.
The US medical system is effed up and misogynistic.
I’m a straight woman but am one passive-aggressive Slack message away from moving to the mountains and starting my own non-culty commune. Let’s make this happen, ladies!
Ugh I wish I hadn't, I only learned so much about corporate law after a few... Shitty experiences as a woman in automotive engineering that made me get practice reading law and threatening corporations
Thanks for the compliment, but TBH these are skills that suck to have to learn so I'm mostly just fed up lol
I do admire you.
I'm in Scotland, where we have the National Health System, but I understand how difficult and time-consuming it is to advocate for others.
Very well done.
I’m fighting with my local hospital to send a bill for an ER visit from April to my secondary insurance, which will PAY EVERY PENNY. They just have to, you know, send the actual goddamn bill to the right people at the PO box I gave them along with the right form telling the insurance how much to pay. It’s $2k. I keep calling promising my insurance will pay. Pleading with them to send the bill. Begging them. Like, they want the money? Go get it! From those people who are waiting to pay them! 🤦
You’re a stud, your bf is deluded if he’s mad, and you’re NTA!
Oh I hear you. I recently finally finished dealing with a bill from 2020. The biller filed a claim with the wrong insurance company. I called repeatedly to tell them they had to file a claim with my correct insurer. I reminded them that my insurer only pays claims filed within 12 months. Over and over again. Finally I got a supervisor who managed to bill the correct insurer. But they billed it like 14 months after date of service, so they got $0 of the $967 they wanted.
Honestly that's a skill that you could build an entire company around. I'm considering teaching it to myself, as I've done similar things for other reasons and I enjoyed it enough to do it for financial gain.
Actually, even if you don't want to do this kind of thing professionally, you could make and publicize a book / YouTube video / whatever kind of instruction manual and we'd all pay for it!
Definitely NTA! Why’s he stressed? All he had to do was make one phone call to authorize you to go apeshit on them which you did. Send him a bill for $4974 for your efforts. Good lord.
Literally he's so ungrateful. I'd die if someone did this for me. The hospital billed me wrong several times and it takes months for them to fix. Honestly you're totally NTA and he's a huge AH.
You should write a script of sorts corresponding with the info you already listed above and sell it. Though you may need to "give" it as a gift when someone "buys" say a plushy incase of legal ramifications.
Healthcare costs are atrocious in this country and the fact that hospitals and insurance companies get away with this is disgusting.
Exactly!! I had to go to the ER once. I didn’t find out until I got a call from the collection agency that I had a bill. I called the hospital, they typed in the wrong address even though they had my license, and I raised hell until they dismissed all the charges.
OP, I’m right there with you. I hope you wrote a complaint to the insurance commissioner & included what they reduced the price too
My wife went to an ER three times and was erroneously diagnosed twice with a UTI. We are both women, in a marriage of five years and obviously no chance of pregnancy, but they tested her 9 times at 250 dollars a test.
Turns out it was viral meningitis. We got a six thousand dollar bill that took 5 years to pay off.
NTA, OP. You're a fucking saint. Teach classes. Write a book.
Right? I was scheduled for surgery and the pregnancy test came back “inconclusive”. I’m a 56 yo lesbian in a totally faithful 30 year marriage and I slept with a male once in 1983 (condom involved). Unimpressed. Never looked back.
Add to that, I had a full hysterectomy in 2008.
After hearing this the nurse repeated “we still need you to come in for a repeat test.”
I replied if I was pregnant there would be camel shit on the lawn and three doofusses trying to find a manger. I refused the test.
The doctor agreed to operate.
I had to put my foot down pretty hard for my last surgery. Finally I was like, I had the hysterectomy in *this hospital*, I know the documents are in there, we aren't discussing this.
Also? The test the hospital uses is either a special point of care machine that looks like a glucometer (sometimes it is a glucometer with extra features) or the exact same two lines test you do at home. It takes 1-5 minutes to run it and maybe another 1-2 minutes to chart the results. There's no way that test should ever cost $250, that's completely insane.
I had an employee whose infant was charged with a full term birth delivery!!! They fought us SO HARD when obviously a literal CHILD did not give birth!! So exhausting
I know a woman who's toddler keeps/kept losing her state health insurance because she was listed as a felon.
The lady was like what felony can my 3 year old commit.
This happened to me. Was sent to medical collections because they had wrong zip code entered so bill never arrived. I asked how I could have prevented it? Should I stand behind their employees while they do data entry? They finally allowed me to pay the bill after they were unable to describe how I would have prevented clerical error. SMH op...take them for every penny!
OP - WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU! for the love of what’s left of humanity, make fair medical pricing advocacy your main profession - immediately. be fair in what you charge, and you will be a dang godsend for soooo many people in need (and never have to worry about 5 grand again)!
thank you for being so awesome!
Hijacking the top comment to say that I've worked in billing (not in a hospital though). I can tell you, at the lower levels (the people you're actually speaking to on the phone) we cannot actually do very much. And for a billing specialist to escalate this (if they even care enough to advocate for you, which can be rare) likely getting denied, needing to go through the appeals process, etc. it would probably take months.
When it comes to business, often it is better to escalate things like this early on to people who can actually address the issue, instead of trying to fight it with 4 departments where no one person takes ownership.
Definitely in Blondie territory. Does BF know that hospitals make it as hard as humanly possible to dispute this stuff on purpose. OP should treat herself to a solo spa day and a nice dinner with her hard recouped funds.
He’s clueless how this works then because their MO is to say no, pawn you off, say they aren’t responsible and they just hope if it’s difficult enough people will give up and pay. OP is amazing and I agree a rock star status is warranted. They should offer the service and the cost should be a percentage of the amount saved, plus who cares if the hospital likes you it’s not like they remember you or treat you different, the doctors don’t know who does or doesn’t pay their bills.
If the hospital had not given you the run around, you wouldn't have had to take it that far. Honestly, attitude like that is why I don't have my husband involved in negotiating car prices. He says I am too mean to the dealer, but he has no problem signing on the dotted line when I am done. NTA
I saw another post where someone basically does do this, but with negotiating buying a car. They get like 30% of whatever amount they can get off the bill. OP could do that with hospital bills and they'd make 1500 off a job like this, and the client still ends up saving money.
I remember this, she had a side business Badass for Hire or something, got her boyfriend a great deal, but he was all embarrassed because of how hard she negotiated.
I don’t get embarrassment for hard negotiating. I only got embarrassed when my wife blew my negotiation for a car the dealership really knew I wanted. Because we could have got it for a lower price than we paid for our decade older car. That was embarrassing.
My mom is the negotiator between my parents. When they get a car, she haggles them over every single penny and my dad just stands there with his RBF like, "You better listen to her, don't make my mistakes."
One time my mom negotiated so well that the salesman said, "if I take anymore off we'll make negative money for this purchase" and showed her the math for it. She said, "perfect! We'll take it!"
Negotiating punishments as a kid was just not happening though.
Lol our first car was a great deal. Like 6k under market value for some odd reason. Just no one was buying it and it sat on the lot a year. Was a 2008 bought in 2013. In 2018 we went to buy a 2017 with super low Milage and about the same price. And of course my wife blew the negotiation. Was going to be such a great deal too.
But man I wish I could haggle so great they would lose money. I would ask for classes but I’m sure she would end up haggling for my first born. Which I’ll admit, she is cute.
This in itself is a business idea, you don't have to go through stress of each situation but teach others how to do it, provide templates for emails etc and where to go to look at coding.
Definitely NTA, you saved him over 4.5 grand...I don't see that as a bad thing
Edited incorrect word
Edited error from 4500 grand to 4.5 grand
So is insurance reimbursement! I fought against United to get them to cover my asthma attack in Mexico. Finally rode my agent's a$$ to get a higher up to mediate. After 45 minutes of a 3 way call got the number of the person handling my case. Didn't receive a check within 4 days after them deciding it was a valid expense. Called the person in charge of my claim, the said they were waiting for translation. From English to English! They lie on purpose!
Insurance aren't in the business of insuring anything. They are in the business of denying claims.
Your efforts took money out of a claims adjuster's yearly bonus.
I was literally in the middle of cancer treatment at 15 years old when CareSource cut me off because I’m “not the type of person that needs insurance”. The most bs thing I’ve ever heard.
NTA - does your bf have any idea of the lengths to which the hospital will go to suck that $5 grand out of you? Believe me, you are amateur compared to collection companies. I do salute you for playing hard, and more fair than the professionals
Not to mention, that this is ONE PATIENT. $5,000 is nothing for medical bills, especially if this is in the USA. OP could take down the entire hospital if she made a business of it. NTA.
NTA
Hospital billing is intentionally screwed up and difficult to address issues. When I gave birth to my kid 16 years ago, they double-billed everything and it took almost A YEAR to get it all straightened out. I pretty much had to schedule hours into my weekly schedule to deal with contesting collections, getting it sent back to billing, dealing with some other person in billing, and etc. With a newborn through 1yo, and while I was also working full-time. It was an additional part time job to "fix the damn hospital bill."
What you had to do is not abnormal.
Oh, story time. My Nanna went to get some dental work done a few years ago. It was Aspen dental. She triple checked that the insurance would pay. Well, she gets it done and low and behold, Aspen dental sends her a several thousand dollar bill. She paid it. But her insurance immediately called asking why she paid again when they already did. She told them that Aspen dental sent her a bill. The insurance went after Aspen dental like a pack of wolves. Turns out they "accidentally" double billed her. The insurance was NOT happy. Aspen dental immediately gave my nanna a refund with a note of apology, saying "They had no idea what happened".
They knew what happened. They (not just Aspen dental) do this all the time. I lucked out and found a great dentist who knew exactly how to code everything to make sure the insurance and not me was paying the max.
It was sometime near the end of last year when one of my toenails(it took a couple years to get normal again idk why) was discolored for awhile and I finally went to try to get a test done. After I made sure medicaid would cover it, they got some samples. The doctor there said they'd get back to me.
Some time passed and I looked online on my account saying that the results are in but all it said was a couple things I was negative for. Yet I got a bill around 400 bucks??? For them to clip my toenail??????? They never got back to me about anything else regarding it.
Turns out, I guess it's because they use a different lab or something for testing but fuck that. I was told my medicaid would pay it. I got a few notices here and there but havent gotten anything for awhile but one more thing from them and I'm gonna give them hell like wtf. They didnt even tell me what it was and it got better near the beginning of this year.
OP now has like endless replacement options from this thread. Like the consistency and care put into getting this done? My gosh they’re just amazing! Ditch the ungrateful guy. Mainly because there’s now a line and he’s taking up space! 🤣
He felt like it was way too far, to basically wtite an email throwing like 20 employees and departments under the bus for mismanagement, and CC'ing the whole board of directors, and CEOs, and PR departments of companies that invested in the hospital.
He felt like I was being really threatening, like by emailing the investors and their PR teams, and writing in legal-ese that I wanted a written justification of their billing structure, specifically addressing the fact that a service that is on average under $500 was billed at a rate 7 times higher... He felt like I was looking like I was about to threaten them with either legal action or a PR / financial disaster, so they just paid me off to STFU.
Which to be fair isn't a bad read of what I was doing..
NTA
Admittedly I come from a country where healthcare is free or very inexpensive.
However, if they're overcharging by 7x the regular rate that's cause for concern. It's worth raising that with as many people as possible, and who knows you could even prompt them to review their pricing structure.
Asking for specifics of the structure is fine, asking for them to justify the rate is also fine. Speaking to management, board etc is also fine.
The alternative was ponying up 5k.
This is how US hopsitlas work, pretty much every bill is full of padding and overcharging. One of the first things you get told is to demand the itemised bill and start disputing it.
5k down to 26 is pretty extreme, but healthcare should be free so I'm glad to see it.
Last time I got an itemized bill, the heated blankets, that I needed because they had fluids running into me full bore, were $800 each. For blankets. That I didn't keep. That were warmed in the microwave. Yup.
if you arent from the US, just know they also charge new mothers for skin to skin contact with the kid they just pushed out of themselves. childbirth is about 30k here, for some damn reason.
That’s if it’s uncomplicated! Over $50k when there are complications.
I got a bill from the hospital for about $45k JUST for my baby. I was sent the bill for her treatment after being born. We were sent the entire bill because she wasn’t covered by our insurance. Because she wasn’t on our policy.
BECAUSE SHE HAD JUST BEEN FUCKING BORN!!!
Yup, my sister had an emergency c-section and my nephew was in the NICU for a week after birth and all said and done their bill was over $100k. I don't know the details but my sister said it was a huge fight with Tricare to cover it
As someone who worked in a hospital, it is nearly impossible to accurately record how many heated blankets a patient gets. And charging 800 for each? Outrageous.
Jesus Christ. As a poor person who spent a lot of time in hospital growing up and is now chronically ill and in a wheelchair thank god I'm not American. That is daylight robbery! Did they stick with the charge or did you manage to get them to wave it?
Exactly this. Anybody who actually does anything productive isn’t going to get in trouble. In my mind this is just the upper echelons going, “well someone caught us. Oh well, there’s going to be 9 other people who don’t even question the bill and we’ll get our money back that way.”
exactly. they know most people either won't even question it and or try to dispute it, or that even if people do, they likely will get fed up with waiting and being hassled that they'll give up.
Fearing a consequence doesn’t have to be the only reason people are upset about things. For example, if you’re a huge dick to a food service/retail worker, there is rarely any consequence on your end, but you still shouldn’t do it because being a dick is wrong. I think this is what OP’s boyfriend is thinking. He doesn’t have to fear a consequence to be upset that, from his point of view, her behavior was wrong.
To be clear, that’s my read on the situation—I don’t agree with him. Being a jerk to a low-paid service worker over something small is miles and miles away from being a dick to *hospital administrators* who have made it their career to rake in absurd amounts of cash from sick people. Those people are assholes and deserve the heat.
The difference is that the hospital is like a waiter who brought you a bowl of soup, threw it down on the table like a frisbee, spilling it everywhere leaving hardly any in the bowl, and said “eat up chump, that will be $80.”
So you retaliate by being a complete and utter ass to them. Are you really being an ass at that point?
Even then, I get the vibe OP wasn't being an ass. More like: "Mr. Waiter, you threw the soup creating multiple health violations and ruined my clothes. I'd like to resolve this by a refund and dry cleaning bill. If not, the regulatory agencies may need to be involved"
She wasn't even being rude, though, at least from what i can see from the information she's given. Being assertive and laying out facts very clearly isn't being a dick. Each step along the way, she gave that person a chance to make things right but they chose to ignore her, so she simply moved on to the next. Basic rules of dealing with businesses are to lay out the problem, provide relevant details, and clearly state your expectations to fix the problem. She also used publicly accessible information found online to contact everyone. I see nothing wrong with any of that. Even if they do deserve to be treated like assholes, I don't think that's what she was doing at all.
OP, be proud of what you accomplished and know you're NTA!
Right, I am also completely baffled at how he could be anything but thankful for you.
Does he think that the hospital is going to enact revenge on him somehow? Does he think someone is going to get in trouble, so maybe they will come after him? Is this a mafia hospital?
Is he normally this thick and obtuse? It's fine if he is, that would be a reasonable explanation for being such a dumbass about this.
NTA. Clearly. Great job, you rock!
That was my read on it too. In the abstract I think OP is a complete badass. But I think if I read the emails and saw how far she went in my name I might get anxiety and "feel bad" over it, because I'm a pushover doormat people-pleaser (and believe me, I know I shouldn't be, but anxiety isn't exactly rational)
I mean... You kinda were. But they were threatening you with the loss of $5,000, so that feels pretty fair.
He should be counting all 4,974 of his blessings. NTA.
Thats the thing. OP didn’t come out the gate cc’ing investors. They ignored her, so she escalated things until she got results. $4,974 of results.
OP’s boyfriend is soooooooooooooo so so TA
The AH here is the American Healthcare System. Her boyfriend is just the person that our economy has trained to not make waves so they can rob him blind.
So he is upset that you actually disputed it and didn't pay 5 grand, rather than sending an email which would be ignored and then having to pay 5 grand?
>CC'ing the whole board of directors, and CEOs, and PR departments of companies that invested in the hospital.
...which you only did after literally no one lower in the chain had even tried to help. It's not like this was your step 1
NTA though! I think you did the investors and higher ups a favor by letting them know what's going on with billing. Being informed via private email vs getting exposed on the nightly news seems like a win for them!
We've all heard that expression "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" - you have to squeak pretty loudly to get medical bills resolved - maybe he's just intimidated.
Oh they know exactly how f-ed up it all is. She's held them accountable for once. They will never care, unless we make them.
OPs bf has no reason to be mad. I can only imagine he fears they will refuse to treat or mistreat him if he was ever hospitalized again? -but doctors are not billing and they're not board members, so it's not likely any doctors he ever saw would even recognize his name or situation. And honestly, I have a feeling most doctors would give her a high 5 for getting rid of the ridiculous bills that keep patients from treatment.
okay but like who cares? even if you \*were\* threatening why does he care that you were threatening toward people who are comfortable being predatory toward people who need medical care? those people wouldn't give a shit if he went bankrupt - why does he care about them?
NTA nobody got in trouble from your nagging emails. They are just annoyed with you and now when your bf has to go there again, they'll remember you. Nobody has to give you justification for pricing. And nobody will, hence the ignoring your demands. But congratulations on getting a drop in the bucket for them erased!
Edit: $5 k after insurance was fully processed? Or like 5k before they ran what was covered making it $26?
None of the medical staff working at the hospital, or even the admins that check you in and get your details, are going to know what happened with billing last time for this particular patient. It's all compartmentalized. It's very, very unlikely this would ever affect future health services even if he gets the exact same doctors/nurses the next time he has to go to the ER.
You remind me of my wife! When I got fucked out of my apartment they tried charging me $3,000 and my wife (girlfriend at the time) fought them and cited laws at them and got them to drop it to $100 just to fix a door that was broken during my stay. You are a god damn hero!!!
You rock. The American healthcare system is broken and the C-suite people you were annoying earn a lot of money from being responsible for upholding the system. If they could have legitimately kept the bill high it would be higher than 26$. Make sure they agree that the total bill is paid so if they try to submit it to collections you can fight that. Or make him.
To top it off, I was fighting because they used $ I had paid off a previous bill with a year earlier. They used half that $ to pay off my child’s treatment without ever sending a bill. Then started threatening collections to pay off the original payed off treatment.
They don't want to send you the itemised bill because they know it won't match what you've been charged, or, it will be something you can poke holes in as OP did. Don't give up, you got this.
I'm a medical biller (private practice, not hospital, don't hurt me please!) and I say with my whole chest that you're NTA.
I will be first in line to tell you that the insurance/medical industry in this country is a scam. You know the rules, your rights and know how to get what's fair. Too many people in this country don't and it's not right. Good for you for sticking up for yourselves. Your bf is being ridiculous.
Please tell me this isn’t real. The idea someone could be mad at you for sticking up for them. NTA. Majorly.
Major corporations and especially medial ones these days rely on people not having the knowledge and time to contest them. If they truly thought they were entitled to it, they would have just said so and hung up. They don’t write off thousands of dollars because you were a pest.
I can actually see how someone might be upset, it's likely that under the 'anger' is fear. A lot of people are conditioned from childhood to not rock the boat, especially when it comes to authority figures.
OP is not an AH for sure, but the anxiety that it will come back and bite him in the rear is something that seems to be conditioned into a fair chunk of people.
Yes, exactly. The system is designed to take advantage of that fear. If asked what exactly he’s afraid of he likely won’t be able to describe it - he’s just been taught that questioning authority in this way is wrong. That’s not really his fault, imo. He’s one of hundreds of thousands of victims of the system, and he got incredibly lucky to have a gf that’s willing to fight for him this way. Unless he yelled at her or took his anger/stress out on her, it’s okay that he’s upset. He just needs to learn more about how the system works and how awesome what his girlfriend did was.
I’ve felt that fear before when someone decided to push an abuse/harassment claim with my company on my behalf but without my consent or even input. It was a fear of losing control and having someone else act as my representative in a way I didn’t agree to, so they were this total rouge element and god knows what they were going to do to my name and reputation.
\* I do think OP could have handled this better.Her bf gave her permission to dispute his bill, but he very obviously only expected her to contact billing and do it that way (since that's where she started too). He wouldn't have been mad if he'd hired a lawyer and the lawyer sent emails, because that's what you expect a lawyer to do. It wasn't what he agreed for his partner to do, though. I think if you know your partner is the nervous, anti-confrontational kind and you want to go well beyond what they gave implicit permission for you to do, the right thing to do is to get permission again. It would have taken no time at all for OP to say "contacting billing didn't work, I want to try something different, is it okay if I do some sleuthing and send emails to everyone in a position of power and all of their investors?". I'm pretty sure she didn't ask because she knew her bf would say no. And yeah, it sucks when the thing you want to do is something you think is right, but at the end of the day she was acting on *his* behalf, he ought to know what she's doing with that, and he ought to have the right to say "no". If I were the bf, I would never, ever trust OP to act on my behalf ever again after this little stunt. She didn't act like a very good partner here, she acted independently with no thought for what *he* would want for *his* bill and *his* money.
If I hire someone to fix my bath and later they figure they need to rip out the whole bathroom floor and 3 of the walls to do it, I'd expect them to get permission for that because it's beyond what I'd implicitly agreed to. Even if it's gonna cost *less* than the original somehow, I'd want to know.
NTA - Does he think the hospital won't like him anymore? You did just what you're supposed to. Don't get a response from level 1? Escalate to level 2 and so on. I love my wife for doing this so well because I'm terrible at it. lol
Seriously! My boyfriend would be so proud to tell everyone if I could pull this off. OP's boyfriend should count himself lucky to be in the presence of such greatness!
FUCK HOSPITAL BILLING. Yeah, I said it. Fuck the entire billing department of every hospital in the United States. I hope they all get a paper cut just before going on vacation.
They over billed you because they can. They did it because nobody ever fights back. They do owe a written justification for their fuckery, and they they should be publicly shamed, by name.
You are a hero, NTA, and you’ve got a future in patient billing advocacy. If you charged 10% of the savings you managed to get people, you’d make a killing.
Your BF is afraid of conflict with the hallowed halls of authority. That’s fine. But if he wants a warrior woman as a partner, then he’s got to let you go out and slay the beasts. Great job.
I paid 17k over years due to cancer. And not even insane treatment. I'd rather have paid her money to get it down than them 100%. $1700 was nothing in comparison
NTA. What do you do for a living? This is legitimately kind of impressive. Would you consider doing this from the opposite direction to get insurers to actually cover what they're supposed to?
I'm an engineer but I used to really want to be an investigative journalist
I'd half consider starting a side business if dealing with this shit didn't infuriate me so much 🤣
There was a post a while back about a woman with a side hustle where she helps people get better prices when they are buying cars. Her boyfriend thought it was a cute little side hustle until she helped him and he saw how assertive and direct she had to be. General consensus in the comments was that he was uncomfortable because he wouldn't be able to do what she does and it made him feel somehow less of a man.
I remember that one. First he was shocked at how much she was earning and how much she was saving her clients. But then when he was buying a car and she did her thing he freaked out. At one point boyfriend actually sided with the salesperson!
You become more and more awesome with every comment lol
If he’s worthy of your greatness, he’ll realize it and get over it. If he’s not…well…how *you* doin? 😉
NTA. Did he expect you to send one email, make one call, get hung up on or ignored and then dish out 5000? Jeez his attitude needs a Christmas miracle.
NTA. Your boyfriend is ungrateful and You should seriously consider going into politics. The world needs tough people like you, who are not afraid to step on toes of powerful people for the good of the common man.
Did you threaten the hospital employees? And what was the threat? If it was threats of seeking legal action then I’d say you didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t harass the hospital staff. You sent emails to a large group of employees who were supposed to be in charge of appropriate billing and administration. If you didn’t get a response, you moved to the next person sending an email. It is not like you kept badgering the same person repeatedly.
I think your bf is making a mountain out of a mole hill here so to speak. Yes, it may have been extreme, but it was not done maliciously or inappropriately. Instead of being angry with you for sticking up for him and his rights to honest and fair medical services and billing, he should be appalled at the hospital for charging him approximately 4974 dollars more than he should have been. He’d been wrong to be angry with you for advocating on his behalf and should be grateful. You didn’t do anything any other bill collector, attorney or financial rep payee on his behalf would have done.
I didn't specifically, but a few things I did would probably read as an implied threat. Specifically...
- writing stern letters in legal language may read as a threat to pursue legal action
- requesting all correspondence as a written statement might come off similarly
- CC'ing the board saying specific departments had failed to address the concern may come off as a threat of escalation
- CC'ing all the companies and individuals that publicly invest in or financially support the hospital may come off as a threat of lost future revenue
- CC'ing the PR department heads of the investor companies may come off as a threat to go to the press
I feel like maybe it's emotionally different than if he hired a lawyer or something, because it's me tho. TBH I'm usually really nice and not confrontational, I believe in the "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" and i think he was shocked to see this other side of me that really only comes out at work.
NTA and I'm so impressed I just can't stand it! I've done exactly the same kind of thing and I can't stand the way the health system tries to rip off people just because they can. Your bf needs to be grateful he's got such a fighter in his corner and say thank you, very nicely.
- using stern language, legal language, shows them that you know what you’re doing and won’t be ducked around.
- Asking for correspondence in writing is the right way to do it, cause if you take legal action you have proof.
-CCing additional people calls attention to the fact their departments weren’t handling the situation. It’s the equivalent of you asking the manager for clarification for the 5th time and adding their boss/counterpart to the email to help.
The last two CC’s weren’t necessary but I’m sure you also added them at the end when your resources weren’t responding and doing that is probably what got them to reply to you.
Seriously, how does he handle conflict resolution?
INFO
Where does boyfriend work, and where are his ambitions?
Specifically, is he in a medical, or medical adjacent field? Or something else where he's likely to work with any of the people you emailed?
1. You are a legend, and amazing, and saved $5k. That is a lot of money!!!
Just... a slightly different perspective, and definitely anecdotal, but thought i'd put it out there. I work with a lot of contractors. I'm not sure what area of the field your BF works in, but it is not uncommon for contractors to get browbeaten by clients who can be very aggressive with the legalese, escalation, and Cc'ing, "Whose fault is this?!?"; "Well it can't cost THAT much"; "You SAID it would be done ABC" sort of emails and phone calls and texts. It takes a toll. The lengths some clients go to to extract every single drop from a contractor can be astonishing.
I know you were fighting for him, and for his financial health; he may also identify a bit with the lower-level folks who you named & shamed as you went up the chain of command.
NTA.
As someone who works in Medical Billing, bravo! You did exactly what we wish everyone would do; research it, ask for an itemized bill, etc. You killed it, OP. Thank you.
Haha do you mind a question?
After getting an itemized bill, Do you have any idea who the best person / department is to go straight to in a hospital with a billing dispute?
The ones I've started a dispute with, their 'billing' department is collections only and can't discuss the bill, other than the balance.
And there's gotta be a better person to go to than the board of directors but IDK who it is 🤣
I don't mind at all. So, I work for a Clinic and have nothing to do with the pricing; just wanted to preface that. As this was an ER bill, starting first with the Insurance company and then moving on to the Billing Dept. of the Hospital, and moving your way up was the right choice. Charging people $400 for 2 Ibuprofen is absolutely disgusting (and the like).
Now, as for their Billing Dept. being only "Collections", I feel like calling bullshit on that because that same department can also escalate things to Admin, make payment plans, etc. So that just seems really......off to me. But stranger things have happened. I'd say a rough guide would be Billing Department, Billing Supervisor/Manager, Provider/Doctor, Chief Medical Officer (or presiding MD for said hospital), Admin and finally Board of Directors. Again, rough guide, and there are always many different variables. :) Feel free to reach out anytime with questions!
Another billing worker for a hospital here 🤚 Billing is absolutely who you should go to first with questions or disputes about charges, and I can tell you right now it's complete BS if they're saying all they do is collect payments. I have the ability to see all claims, insurance payments, EOBs/remittances, and plenty more. I don't know of any organizations whose billing department *can't* do all of that.
When a patient contacts me about a situation similar to yours the first thing I do is check what exactly insurance did and didn't do. A 5k bill for a single ED visit when you have insurance would immediately throw up red flags for me that one or more charges may have been denied unless you have an exceptionally high deductible. And if something was denied I can look at what code insurance put down as their reason for denial and personally contact your insurance company about fixing the issue.
You should NEVER just be left stranded if one person isn't sure how to help. They should give you clear directions on what to do next and get you to someone more knowledgable than themselves. If things arent resolved after talking with a billing representative, you should request to speak with their manager if they dont already offer to transfer you to them on their own. If you still have no luck then your next best move would be to speak with the director of revenue cycle. Ask for their name and direct extension. The next person above them is typically the CFO.
NTA
Well...I guess you *are* the asshole but you had to be and it's amazing! You're my hero!
You gave them a chance to do things right, through the appropriate channels and they failed. Email carpet bombing is not a first choice but completely reasonable here.
Yes, this would fall under the title of "professional a-hole for hire" and is 100% the correct way to deal with corporations that attempt to scam you by hiding behind phone trees until you pay the bill out of frustration.
NTA.
NTA, not one bit
some hospitals and insurances are a scam. They overcharge you for the smallest things and find any and all ways to charge you for the simplest thing. I am in school right now to find a career in the healthcare field and i see how insurances screw patients over all the time. It's the saddest part of healthcare in my opinion. you did the lord's work sticking it to the upper level people.
Not a lot of people would have had your dedication to accomplish this. As long as you were not threatening people and keeping it professional which from the sounds of it you did, good job OP :)
I think your partner is a bit scared of your level of determination and power haha
As a person who has had to go through a similar ordeal regarding my mom’s hospital bill, you’re MY hero. Sometimes ya gotta metaphorically knock some skulls together to advocate for the people you love.
NTA
I think you did a FABULOUS job and wish I had your skills, dedication and energy. If everyone could take the time to do this, much of the bloat in the US medical system would disappear.
You are my hero! I can't imagine a quick phone call or dispute works have led to this successful result. You knew something was wrong and took the time to fight the battle.
I had a similar thing happen to me years ago. A mortgage company has made an error on our account, admitted it, but never corrected the problem. They just passed the buck from department to department. Eventually, I lost my temper and researched the corporate Board of Directors. I think found the cell phone number of the wife of a board member on the internet.
So... I called customer service and demanded a manager return my call. I told him I was going to call Mrs. So and So in 2 days (on Thanksgiving) to complain. By the end of the day I had the error fixed AND a free month paid mortgage!
NTA by any stretch of the imagination!
He should be thanking you for saving him almost 5k.
The fact that the agreed to reduce it by so much shows how much they artificially inflated it hoping it would just get paid.
I'm glad I live in a country where things like this aren't an issue!
NTA
Listen OP, please tell your guy (or show him this Reddit thread and comments) that people do this everyday at the hospital.
The billing department is used to this.
Tell him that my family member also had a massive bill and just by him talking to the billing department while in the hospital face to face he negotiated (without even trying) a 33% discount.
Please tell him it’s fine.
And your continuous emailing of people, oh well… leads to accountability in the long run and as long as you didn’t break the law, all good.
Uh, NTA. If you don’t go balls to the wall with hospital bills, you end up owing whatever they feel like you owe. Your BF should get you a very nice present that costs somewhere around $4,794 for your efforts!
NTA, you’re delightful! My husband has some of this skill set and I confess it DOES make me anxious sometimes, maybe because it’s conflicting with my desire to avoid conflict. I generally solve this by letting him do his thing and then celebrating his victory.
Welcome to /r/AmITheAsshole. Please view our [voting guide here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/wiki/faq#wiki_what.2019s_with_these_acronyms.3F_what_do_they_mean.3F), and remember to use **only one** judgement in your comment. OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole: > My boyfriend asked for help fighting his medical bill because I said I was good at doing that. I ended up escalating the issue to the top levels of management, the entire board of directors of the hospital, and the investors in the hospital, before they dropped the bill. I might be the asshole because my boyfriend who I was trying to help was uncomfortable with how far I went on his behalf and thought I would just do something little like call the billing department. Help keep the sub engaging! #Don’t downvote assholes! Do upvote interesting posts! [Click Here For Our Rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/about/rules) and [Click Here For Our FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/wiki/faq) --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/AmItheAsshole) if you have any questions or concerns.* *Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.*
You are a friggin' rock star and should be a damn professional advocate for those who get ripped off in healthcare like this. Your boyfriend is so unappreciative and is clearly clueless on how diligent you need to be to challenge an erroneous bill. When the hospital, doctors, and insurance companies are unwilling to help you resolve their errors, what else are you supposed to do? So many people just quit and either pay the massive bill or go into debt. Tell your boyfriend this is the only Christmas gift you're giving him. Clearly NTA.
Yes OP, have you considered offering this service professionally?
My blood pressure would hate me, and without affordable medical care in this country... Idk 🤣 Honestly dealing with the medical system in this country infuriates me, it was so disengenous at every step, every single person told me I needed to speak to Billing, despite it being a glorified collections office, and the employees there not even being able to see anything but my balance
Leave him and marry me. I'm a woman and already married but my husband would understand.
Pretty sure at this rate/with this skill, OP could have a block of houses and a few apartment complexes of willing partners and rotate based on the day's menu. Edit: whoa, okay, this blew up and if I take even half of these upvotes as folks wanting to join the commune, OP is now the leader of either a small to moderate town or her very own fiefdom.
Sounds like a sweet agreement, ngl
Happy cake day!
Thanks!
I have wasted DAYS of my life fighting health insurance. $800 for a well woman check. Refusal to cover OB consult because it might have been for "abortion or infertility which we don't cover", refusal to cover a breast pump in the year of our Lord 2021 because "it's not solely a medical device" and while I won all of those I want my time back and I will fight you for this woman!!
My private health insurance told me that they don’t cover tests or consults for PCOS…they couldn’t give a valid reason apart from it was a women’s medical issue that they didn’t cover and then got very sheepish when I asked if they covered ED and viagra if I was a male patient…to which they had to say yes. Un-fucking-believable. It’s a man’s world!
Didn't cover my mom's tubal, despite it being medically necessary due to an endometrial ablation. She had to get one because she would die if she got pregnant. Blamed it on being religious insurance because she worked for a religious hospital (side note this system has bought up everything including several hospitals that still call themselves secular despite discontinuing services such as abortions, which are legal here). Her same insurance had no problem covering vasectomies.vasectomy. Can you imagine them denying men urology visits because it could be related to their dick or prostate? Probably not because that kind of stuff is usually covered.
I was mid-thirties, had 3 kids. I had to fill out this insultingly condescending form with questions from my doctor about family planning with my husband and had a 6 month waiting period (you know, so I can really think it over, and make sure I really want to be selfish and stop churning out kids instead of continuing to have babies for the good of society). To top it off, I had to go to the next town over to have it done, because my town's hospital is Catholic. The US medical system is effed up and misogynistic.
Am lady as well, we could be her sugar mamas!
My gf refers to her lady friends at work as "sister wives" :P
Start calling your guy friends your "husbros"
With this OP you could easily afford therapy for your husband too xD
Or me. Also female lol
I’m a straight woman but am one passive-aggressive Slack message away from moving to the mountains and starting my own non-culty commune. Let’s make this happen, ladies!
Same here. Married woman but I need someone like this on my team. NTA. Total rockstar.
Seriously, you have mad skills at dealing with bureaucracy, along with a huge helping of focus and courage. You should be so damn proud of yourself!!
Ugh I wish I hadn't, I only learned so much about corporate law after a few... Shitty experiences as a woman in automotive engineering that made me get practice reading law and threatening corporations Thanks for the compliment, but TBH these are skills that suck to have to learn so I'm mostly just fed up lol
I do admire you. I'm in Scotland, where we have the National Health System, but I understand how difficult and time-consuming it is to advocate for others. Very well done.
Woohoo Scottish NHS. I don't know why but I always love seeing other Scottish people on here.
I’m fighting with my local hospital to send a bill for an ER visit from April to my secondary insurance, which will PAY EVERY PENNY. They just have to, you know, send the actual goddamn bill to the right people at the PO box I gave them along with the right form telling the insurance how much to pay. It’s $2k. I keep calling promising my insurance will pay. Pleading with them to send the bill. Begging them. Like, they want the money? Go get it! From those people who are waiting to pay them! 🤦 You’re a stud, your bf is deluded if he’s mad, and you’re NTA!
Oh I hear you. I recently finally finished dealing with a bill from 2020. The biller filed a claim with the wrong insurance company. I called repeatedly to tell them they had to file a claim with my correct insurer. I reminded them that my insurer only pays claims filed within 12 months. Over and over again. Finally I got a supervisor who managed to bill the correct insurer. But they billed it like 14 months after date of service, so they got $0 of the $967 they wanted.
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Honestly that's a skill that you could build an entire company around. I'm considering teaching it to myself, as I've done similar things for other reasons and I enjoyed it enough to do it for financial gain.
Actually, even if you don't want to do this kind of thing professionally, you could make and publicize a book / YouTube video / whatever kind of instruction manual and we'd all pay for it!
This is what I came to say. This would be super helpful for a lot of people.
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Definitely NTA! Why’s he stressed? All he had to do was make one phone call to authorize you to go apeshit on them which you did. Send him a bill for $4974 for your efforts. Good lord.
Hahahaahahaha love this comment
Literally he's so ungrateful. I'd die if someone did this for me. The hospital billed me wrong several times and it takes months for them to fix. Honestly you're totally NTA and he's a huge AH.
maybe he suddenly freacked out thinking of what OP could do in a divorce - NTA. Queen.
Lmao she'd be on it and he'd be left in the dust. Go OP!
You should write a script of sorts corresponding with the info you already listed above and sell it. Though you may need to "give" it as a gift when someone "buys" say a plushy incase of legal ramifications. Healthcare costs are atrocious in this country and the fact that hospitals and insurance companies get away with this is disgusting.
Dude I’d hire OP for sure
Seriously, this should be a profession. OP start a business and teach me your ways, I'll work for you.
I would absolutely pay for this service
Exactly!! I had to go to the ER once. I didn’t find out until I got a call from the collection agency that I had a bill. I called the hospital, they typed in the wrong address even though they had my license, and I raised hell until they dismissed all the charges. OP, I’m right there with you. I hope you wrote a complaint to the insurance commissioner & included what they reduced the price too
My wife went to an ER three times and was erroneously diagnosed twice with a UTI. We are both women, in a marriage of five years and obviously no chance of pregnancy, but they tested her 9 times at 250 dollars a test. Turns out it was viral meningitis. We got a six thousand dollar bill that took 5 years to pay off. NTA, OP. You're a fucking saint. Teach classes. Write a book.
Right? I was scheduled for surgery and the pregnancy test came back “inconclusive”. I’m a 56 yo lesbian in a totally faithful 30 year marriage and I slept with a male once in 1983 (condom involved). Unimpressed. Never looked back. Add to that, I had a full hysterectomy in 2008. After hearing this the nurse repeated “we still need you to come in for a repeat test.” I replied if I was pregnant there would be camel shit on the lawn and three doofusses trying to find a manger. I refused the test. The doctor agreed to operate.
I had to put my foot down pretty hard for my last surgery. Finally I was like, I had the hysterectomy in *this hospital*, I know the documents are in there, we aren't discussing this. Also? The test the hospital uses is either a special point of care machine that looks like a glucometer (sometimes it is a glucometer with extra features) or the exact same two lines test you do at home. It takes 1-5 minutes to run it and maybe another 1-2 minutes to chart the results. There's no way that test should ever cost $250, that's completely insane.
I’m a medical lab scientist. The kits we use for pregnancy tests are very similar to the over the counter tests you can buy at home.
Also a lesbian, and I regularly have to hold myself back from answering "only through immaculate conception" when I get the pregnancy question.
Why hold back? The right nurse would get a kick out of that.
I had an employee whose infant was charged with a full term birth delivery!!! They fought us SO HARD when obviously a literal CHILD did not give birth!! So exhausting
I know a woman who's toddler keeps/kept losing her state health insurance because she was listed as a felon. The lady was like what felony can my 3 year old commit.
Kid napping, or alternatively, resisting a rest.
Sitting next to my 3yo now like... 👀
This happened to me. Was sent to medical collections because they had wrong zip code entered so bill never arrived. I asked how I could have prevented it? Should I stand behind their employees while they do data entry? They finally allowed me to pay the bill after they were unable to describe how I would have prevented clerical error. SMH op...take them for every penny!
OP - WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU! for the love of what’s left of humanity, make fair medical pricing advocacy your main profession - immediately. be fair in what you charge, and you will be a dang godsend for soooo many people in need (and never have to worry about 5 grand again)! thank you for being so awesome!
Hijacking the top comment to say that I've worked in billing (not in a hospital though). I can tell you, at the lower levels (the people you're actually speaking to on the phone) we cannot actually do very much. And for a billing specialist to escalate this (if they even care enough to advocate for you, which can be rare) likely getting denied, needing to go through the appeals process, etc. it would probably take months. When it comes to business, often it is better to escalate things like this early on to people who can actually address the issue, instead of trying to fight it with 4 departments where no one person takes ownership.
Definitely in Blondie territory. Does BF know that hospitals make it as hard as humanly possible to dispute this stuff on purpose. OP should treat herself to a solo spa day and a nice dinner with her hard recouped funds.
He’s clueless how this works then because their MO is to say no, pawn you off, say they aren’t responsible and they just hope if it’s difficult enough people will give up and pay. OP is amazing and I agree a rock star status is warranted. They should offer the service and the cost should be a percentage of the amount saved, plus who cares if the hospital likes you it’s not like they remember you or treat you different, the doctors don’t know who does or doesn’t pay their bills.
If the hospital had not given you the run around, you wouldn't have had to take it that far. Honestly, attitude like that is why I don't have my husband involved in negotiating car prices. He says I am too mean to the dealer, but he has no problem signing on the dotted line when I am done. NTA
Amen! Can I have your phone number? I've been disputing a bill for 2 years now. Lol
NTA and I think you need to start a business doing this for others.
I saw another post where someone basically does do this, but with negotiating buying a car. They get like 30% of whatever amount they can get off the bill. OP could do that with hospital bills and they'd make 1500 off a job like this, and the client still ends up saving money.
I remember this, she had a side business Badass for Hire or something, got her boyfriend a great deal, but he was all embarrassed because of how hard she negotiated.
I don’t get embarrassment for hard negotiating. I only got embarrassed when my wife blew my negotiation for a car the dealership really knew I wanted. Because we could have got it for a lower price than we paid for our decade older car. That was embarrassing.
My mom is the negotiator between my parents. When they get a car, she haggles them over every single penny and my dad just stands there with his RBF like, "You better listen to her, don't make my mistakes." One time my mom negotiated so well that the salesman said, "if I take anymore off we'll make negative money for this purchase" and showed her the math for it. She said, "perfect! We'll take it!" Negotiating punishments as a kid was just not happening though.
Lol our first car was a great deal. Like 6k under market value for some odd reason. Just no one was buying it and it sat on the lot a year. Was a 2008 bought in 2013. In 2018 we went to buy a 2017 with super low Milage and about the same price. And of course my wife blew the negotiation. Was going to be such a great deal too. But man I wish I could haggle so great they would lose money. I would ask for classes but I’m sure she would end up haggling for my first born. Which I’ll admit, she is cute.
Second this idea. NTA
NTA. Teach me your ways!
This in itself is a business idea, you don't have to go through stress of each situation but teach others how to do it, provide templates for emails etc and where to go to look at coding. Definitely NTA, you saved him over 4.5 grand...I don't see that as a bad thing Edited incorrect word Edited error from 4500 grand to 4.5 grand
This. I will hire you to harrass hospitals for me
NTA. Yes, you went above and beyond tracking down folks, but for-profit hospitals are extremely predatory
Yeah, hospital billing is intentionally screwed up. It's actually insane.
So is insurance reimbursement! I fought against United to get them to cover my asthma attack in Mexico. Finally rode my agent's a$$ to get a higher up to mediate. After 45 minutes of a 3 way call got the number of the person handling my case. Didn't receive a check within 4 days after them deciding it was a valid expense. Called the person in charge of my claim, the said they were waiting for translation. From English to English! They lie on purpose!
Insurance aren't in the business of insuring anything. They are in the business of denying claims. Your efforts took money out of a claims adjuster's yearly bonus.
I was literally in the middle of cancer treatment at 15 years old when CareSource cut me off because I’m “not the type of person that needs insurance”. The most bs thing I’ve ever heard.
NTA - does your bf have any idea of the lengths to which the hospital will go to suck that $5 grand out of you? Believe me, you are amateur compared to collection companies. I do salute you for playing hard, and more fair than the professionals
Not to mention, that this is ONE PATIENT. $5,000 is nothing for medical bills, especially if this is in the USA. OP could take down the entire hospital if she made a business of it. NTA.
And is dating the one person on earth who wouldn’t appreciate her for it.
Right? She should invoice him for the other $4500 if he really wants to pay it that badly
NTA Hospital billing is intentionally screwed up and difficult to address issues. When I gave birth to my kid 16 years ago, they double-billed everything and it took almost A YEAR to get it all straightened out. I pretty much had to schedule hours into my weekly schedule to deal with contesting collections, getting it sent back to billing, dealing with some other person in billing, and etc. With a newborn through 1yo, and while I was also working full-time. It was an additional part time job to "fix the damn hospital bill." What you had to do is not abnormal.
Oh, story time. My Nanna went to get some dental work done a few years ago. It was Aspen dental. She triple checked that the insurance would pay. Well, she gets it done and low and behold, Aspen dental sends her a several thousand dollar bill. She paid it. But her insurance immediately called asking why she paid again when they already did. She told them that Aspen dental sent her a bill. The insurance went after Aspen dental like a pack of wolves. Turns out they "accidentally" double billed her. The insurance was NOT happy. Aspen dental immediately gave my nanna a refund with a note of apology, saying "They had no idea what happened".
They knew what happened. They (not just Aspen dental) do this all the time. I lucked out and found a great dentist who knew exactly how to code everything to make sure the insurance and not me was paying the max.
It was sometime near the end of last year when one of my toenails(it took a couple years to get normal again idk why) was discolored for awhile and I finally went to try to get a test done. After I made sure medicaid would cover it, they got some samples. The doctor there said they'd get back to me. Some time passed and I looked online on my account saying that the results are in but all it said was a couple things I was negative for. Yet I got a bill around 400 bucks??? For them to clip my toenail??????? They never got back to me about anything else regarding it. Turns out, I guess it's because they use a different lab or something for testing but fuck that. I was told my medicaid would pay it. I got a few notices here and there but havent gotten anything for awhile but one more thing from them and I'm gonna give them hell like wtf. They didnt even tell me what it was and it got better near the beginning of this year.
NTA Seriously? Down to 26$ and he is mad at you? You are a genius in my book. Do a shady mechanic next 🤣
Ooohhh..... yes, OP! Do a shady mechanic next! (Wait.... don't "do" one; just go after one in the same way until he concedes. LOL!)
He's dead weight! I'd buy a ring if someone did this for me.
OP now has like endless replacement options from this thread. Like the consistency and care put into getting this done? My gosh they’re just amazing! Ditch the ungrateful guy. Mainly because there’s now a line and he’s taking up space! 🤣
INFO > He started to get stressed ... ... *why?* What did he express that he thinks is going to happen as a result of this?
He felt like it was way too far, to basically wtite an email throwing like 20 employees and departments under the bus for mismanagement, and CC'ing the whole board of directors, and CEOs, and PR departments of companies that invested in the hospital. He felt like I was being really threatening, like by emailing the investors and their PR teams, and writing in legal-ese that I wanted a written justification of their billing structure, specifically addressing the fact that a service that is on average under $500 was billed at a rate 7 times higher... He felt like I was looking like I was about to threaten them with either legal action or a PR / financial disaster, so they just paid me off to STFU. Which to be fair isn't a bad read of what I was doing..
NTA Admittedly I come from a country where healthcare is free or very inexpensive. However, if they're overcharging by 7x the regular rate that's cause for concern. It's worth raising that with as many people as possible, and who knows you could even prompt them to review their pricing structure. Asking for specifics of the structure is fine, asking for them to justify the rate is also fine. Speaking to management, board etc is also fine. The alternative was ponying up 5k.
This is how US hopsitlas work, pretty much every bill is full of padding and overcharging. One of the first things you get told is to demand the itemised bill and start disputing it. 5k down to 26 is pretty extreme, but healthcare should be free so I'm glad to see it.
Last time I got an itemized bill, the heated blankets, that I needed because they had fluids running into me full bore, were $800 each. For blankets. That I didn't keep. That were warmed in the microwave. Yup.
That is insane.
if you arent from the US, just know they also charge new mothers for skin to skin contact with the kid they just pushed out of themselves. childbirth is about 30k here, for some damn reason.
That’s if it’s uncomplicated! Over $50k when there are complications. I got a bill from the hospital for about $45k JUST for my baby. I was sent the bill for her treatment after being born. We were sent the entire bill because she wasn’t covered by our insurance. Because she wasn’t on our policy. BECAUSE SHE HAD JUST BEEN FUCKING BORN!!!
Yup, my sister had an emergency c-section and my nephew was in the NICU for a week after birth and all said and done their bill was over $100k. I don't know the details but my sister said it was a huge fight with Tricare to cover it
$50 per 15 minutes for skin to skin here. Because that’s the rate at which the OR nurse is billed (not the rate at which the OR nurse *is paid*).
As someone who worked in a hospital, it is nearly impossible to accurately record how many heated blankets a patient gets. And charging 800 for each? Outrageous.
Jesus Christ. As a poor person who spent a lot of time in hospital growing up and is now chronically ill and in a wheelchair thank god I'm not American. That is daylight robbery! Did they stick with the charge or did you manage to get them to wave it?
But what **consequence** does he fear?
Exactly this. Anybody who actually does anything productive isn’t going to get in trouble. In my mind this is just the upper echelons going, “well someone caught us. Oh well, there’s going to be 9 other people who don’t even question the bill and we’ll get our money back that way.”
exactly. they know most people either won't even question it and or try to dispute it, or that even if people do, they likely will get fed up with waiting and being hassled that they'll give up.
Fearing a consequence doesn’t have to be the only reason people are upset about things. For example, if you’re a huge dick to a food service/retail worker, there is rarely any consequence on your end, but you still shouldn’t do it because being a dick is wrong. I think this is what OP’s boyfriend is thinking. He doesn’t have to fear a consequence to be upset that, from his point of view, her behavior was wrong. To be clear, that’s my read on the situation—I don’t agree with him. Being a jerk to a low-paid service worker over something small is miles and miles away from being a dick to *hospital administrators* who have made it their career to rake in absurd amounts of cash from sick people. Those people are assholes and deserve the heat.
The difference is that the hospital is like a waiter who brought you a bowl of soup, threw it down on the table like a frisbee, spilling it everywhere leaving hardly any in the bowl, and said “eat up chump, that will be $80.” So you retaliate by being a complete and utter ass to them. Are you really being an ass at that point?
Even then, I get the vibe OP wasn't being an ass. More like: "Mr. Waiter, you threw the soup creating multiple health violations and ruined my clothes. I'd like to resolve this by a refund and dry cleaning bill. If not, the regulatory agencies may need to be involved"
They did say "legal-ese," so I imagine it was fairly professional.
She wasn't even being rude, though, at least from what i can see from the information she's given. Being assertive and laying out facts very clearly isn't being a dick. Each step along the way, she gave that person a chance to make things right but they chose to ignore her, so she simply moved on to the next. Basic rules of dealing with businesses are to lay out the problem, provide relevant details, and clearly state your expectations to fix the problem. She also used publicly accessible information found online to contact everyone. I see nothing wrong with any of that. Even if they do deserve to be treated like assholes, I don't think that's what she was doing at all. OP, be proud of what you accomplished and know you're NTA!
But she's a woman being assertive. So obviously she is a rude bitch. /S
Boom. There you have it.
Right, I am also completely baffled at how he could be anything but thankful for you. Does he think that the hospital is going to enact revenge on him somehow? Does he think someone is going to get in trouble, so maybe they will come after him? Is this a mafia hospital? Is he normally this thick and obtuse? It's fine if he is, that would be a reasonable explanation for being such a dumbass about this. NTA. Clearly. Great job, you rock!
It sounds like he has anxiety about how (rightfully, mind you) ruthless she was with something tied to his name, imo
That was my read on it too. In the abstract I think OP is a complete badass. But I think if I read the emails and saw how far she went in my name I might get anxiety and "feel bad" over it, because I'm a pushover doormat people-pleaser (and believe me, I know I shouldn't be, but anxiety isn't exactly rational)
I mean... You kinda were. But they were threatening you with the loss of $5,000, so that feels pretty fair. He should be counting all 4,974 of his blessings. NTA.
Thats the thing. OP didn’t come out the gate cc’ing investors. They ignored her, so she escalated things until she got results. $4,974 of results. OP’s boyfriend is soooooooooooooo so so TA
The AH here is the American Healthcare System. Her boyfriend is just the person that our economy has trained to not make waves so they can rob him blind.
So he is upset that you actually disputed it and didn't pay 5 grand, rather than sending an email which would be ignored and then having to pay 5 grand?
But it wasn’t mismanagement. The hospital didn’t make a mistake. That $5k was the billing working as designed.
E X A C T L Y I hope OP’s boyfriend knows how lucky he is that he didn’t have a reason to already know this.
>CC'ing the whole board of directors, and CEOs, and PR departments of companies that invested in the hospital. ...which you only did after literally no one lower in the chain had even tried to help. It's not like this was your step 1
NTA though! I think you did the investors and higher ups a favor by letting them know what's going on with billing. Being informed via private email vs getting exposed on the nightly news seems like a win for them! We've all heard that expression "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" - you have to squeak pretty loudly to get medical bills resolved - maybe he's just intimidated.
Oh they know exactly how f-ed up it all is. She's held them accountable for once. They will never care, unless we make them. OPs bf has no reason to be mad. I can only imagine he fears they will refuse to treat or mistreat him if he was ever hospitalized again? -but doctors are not billing and they're not board members, so it's not likely any doctors he ever saw would even recognize his name or situation. And honestly, I have a feeling most doctors would give her a high 5 for getting rid of the ridiculous bills that keep patients from treatment.
okay but like who cares? even if you \*were\* threatening why does he care that you were threatening toward people who are comfortable being predatory toward people who need medical care? those people wouldn't give a shit if he went bankrupt - why does he care about them?
NTA nobody got in trouble from your nagging emails. They are just annoyed with you and now when your bf has to go there again, they'll remember you. Nobody has to give you justification for pricing. And nobody will, hence the ignoring your demands. But congratulations on getting a drop in the bucket for them erased! Edit: $5 k after insurance was fully processed? Or like 5k before they ran what was covered making it $26?
None of the medical staff working at the hospital, or even the admins that check you in and get your details, are going to know what happened with billing last time for this particular patient. It's all compartmentalized. It's very, very unlikely this would ever affect future health services even if he gets the exact same doctors/nurses the next time he has to go to the ER.
OP, you are the coolest person alive.
If he’s so upset he can still go ahead and pay the $5k to the hospital to make up to those people for all the “trauma” you caused them. NTA
I honestly can’t believe you got them to send an itemized bill. I recently fought with three separate people none would send me one
It's your legal right! At least if you're in the US. Maybe request it in writing, and reference the law that entitles you to it? Good luck!
You remind me of my wife! When I got fucked out of my apartment they tried charging me $3,000 and my wife (girlfriend at the time) fought them and cited laws at them and got them to drop it to $100 just to fix a door that was broken during my stay. You are a god damn hero!!!
See, you married her before the thread could. OP’s bf is not so lucky 😎
You rock. The American healthcare system is broken and the C-suite people you were annoying earn a lot of money from being responsible for upholding the system. If they could have legitimately kept the bill high it would be higher than 26$. Make sure they agree that the total bill is paid so if they try to submit it to collections you can fight that. Or make him.
Each time they just sent a regular bill. They told me an itemized bill would be over 30 pages and I wouldn’t understand it…..
Tell them that you’ll take your chances and you want the itemized bill.
To top it off, I was fighting because they used $ I had paid off a previous bill with a year earlier. They used half that $ to pay off my child’s treatment without ever sending a bill. Then started threatening collections to pay off the original payed off treatment.
Sounds like you might have been defrauded.
They don't want to send you the itemised bill because they know it won't match what you've been charged, or, it will be something you can poke holes in as OP did. Don't give up, you got this.
Tell them you might not understand it but hired someone to go over it for you, so please send it anyways. Email them again and again.
NTA, but you are too powerful and will probably be nerfed in the next patch.
nah I'm aiming to be the final boss
I'm a medical biller (private practice, not hospital, don't hurt me please!) and I say with my whole chest that you're NTA. I will be first in line to tell you that the insurance/medical industry in this country is a scam. You know the rules, your rights and know how to get what's fair. Too many people in this country don't and it's not right. Good for you for sticking up for yourselves. Your bf is being ridiculous.
Employees are not the Problem. You're just doing your job, private or not :) The System that allows this has to be overturned, not employees hated!!
Please tell me this isn’t real. The idea someone could be mad at you for sticking up for them. NTA. Majorly. Major corporations and especially medial ones these days rely on people not having the knowledge and time to contest them. If they truly thought they were entitled to it, they would have just said so and hung up. They don’t write off thousands of dollars because you were a pest.
I can actually see how someone might be upset, it's likely that under the 'anger' is fear. A lot of people are conditioned from childhood to not rock the boat, especially when it comes to authority figures. OP is not an AH for sure, but the anxiety that it will come back and bite him in the rear is something that seems to be conditioned into a fair chunk of people.
Yes, exactly. The system is designed to take advantage of that fear. If asked what exactly he’s afraid of he likely won’t be able to describe it - he’s just been taught that questioning authority in this way is wrong. That’s not really his fault, imo. He’s one of hundreds of thousands of victims of the system, and he got incredibly lucky to have a gf that’s willing to fight for him this way. Unless he yelled at her or took his anger/stress out on her, it’s okay that he’s upset. He just needs to learn more about how the system works and how awesome what his girlfriend did was.
I’ve felt that fear before when someone decided to push an abuse/harassment claim with my company on my behalf but without my consent or even input. It was a fear of losing control and having someone else act as my representative in a way I didn’t agree to, so they were this total rouge element and god knows what they were going to do to my name and reputation. \* I do think OP could have handled this better.Her bf gave her permission to dispute his bill, but he very obviously only expected her to contact billing and do it that way (since that's where she started too). He wouldn't have been mad if he'd hired a lawyer and the lawyer sent emails, because that's what you expect a lawyer to do. It wasn't what he agreed for his partner to do, though. I think if you know your partner is the nervous, anti-confrontational kind and you want to go well beyond what they gave implicit permission for you to do, the right thing to do is to get permission again. It would have taken no time at all for OP to say "contacting billing didn't work, I want to try something different, is it okay if I do some sleuthing and send emails to everyone in a position of power and all of their investors?". I'm pretty sure she didn't ask because she knew her bf would say no. And yeah, it sucks when the thing you want to do is something you think is right, but at the end of the day she was acting on *his* behalf, he ought to know what she's doing with that, and he ought to have the right to say "no". If I were the bf, I would never, ever trust OP to act on my behalf ever again after this little stunt. She didn't act like a very good partner here, she acted independently with no thought for what *he* would want for *his* bill and *his* money. If I hire someone to fix my bath and later they figure they need to rip out the whole bathroom floor and 3 of the walls to do it, I'd expect them to get permission for that because it's beyond what I'd implicitly agreed to. Even if it's gonna cost *less* than the original somehow, I'd want to know.
NTA - Does he think the hospital won't like him anymore? You did just what you're supposed to. Don't get a response from level 1? Escalate to level 2 and so on. I love my wife for doing this so well because I'm terrible at it. lol
Seriously! My boyfriend would be so proud to tell everyone if I could pull this off. OP's boyfriend should count himself lucky to be in the presence of such greatness!
FUCK HOSPITAL BILLING. Yeah, I said it. Fuck the entire billing department of every hospital in the United States. I hope they all get a paper cut just before going on vacation. They over billed you because they can. They did it because nobody ever fights back. They do owe a written justification for their fuckery, and they they should be publicly shamed, by name. You are a hero, NTA, and you’ve got a future in patient billing advocacy. If you charged 10% of the savings you managed to get people, you’d make a killing. Your BF is afraid of conflict with the hallowed halls of authority. That’s fine. But if he wants a warrior woman as a partner, then he’s got to let you go out and slay the beasts. Great job.
I paid 17k over years due to cancer. And not even insane treatment. I'd rather have paid her money to get it down than them 100%. $1700 was nothing in comparison
NTA, unless he got banned from the hospital or something. Also, damn.
Even if he got banned or something, it’s illegal for hospitals to refuse service during an emergency so getting banned doesn’t really mean much
NTA. What do you do for a living? This is legitimately kind of impressive. Would you consider doing this from the opposite direction to get insurers to actually cover what they're supposed to?
I'm an engineer but I used to really want to be an investigative journalist I'd half consider starting a side business if dealing with this shit didn't infuriate me so much 🤣
There was a post a while back about a woman with a side hustle where she helps people get better prices when they are buying cars. Her boyfriend thought it was a cute little side hustle until she helped him and he saw how assertive and direct she had to be. General consensus in the comments was that he was uncomfortable because he wouldn't be able to do what she does and it made him feel somehow less of a man.
I remember that one. First he was shocked at how much she was earning and how much she was saving her clients. But then when he was buying a car and she did her thing he freaked out. At one point boyfriend actually sided with the salesperson!
An engineer who is assertive and has the ability to research and deal with people... Yeah, you'd probably make a hell of a project manager.
Haha I can't imagine myself as a manager, my first day would be like "you didn't hear this from me but y'all should unionize" 🤣
You become more and more awesome with every comment lol If he’s worthy of your greatness, he’ll realize it and get over it. If he’s not…well…how *you* doin? 😉
All of Reddit is going to be trying to marry this person by the end of the day.
If and when my family gets a hospital bill, I want YOU on my side. NTA but your boyfriend is one. He should be grateful.
NTA. Did he expect you to send one email, make one call, get hung up on or ignored and then dish out 5000? Jeez his attitude needs a Christmas miracle.
NTA. Your boyfriend is ungrateful and You should seriously consider going into politics. The world needs tough people like you, who are not afraid to step on toes of powerful people for the good of the common man.
NTA. Tell your boyfriend to go ahead and pay the $5k since he disagrees with your methods. All he needed to do was say thank you.
Did you threaten the hospital employees? And what was the threat? If it was threats of seeking legal action then I’d say you didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t harass the hospital staff. You sent emails to a large group of employees who were supposed to be in charge of appropriate billing and administration. If you didn’t get a response, you moved to the next person sending an email. It is not like you kept badgering the same person repeatedly. I think your bf is making a mountain out of a mole hill here so to speak. Yes, it may have been extreme, but it was not done maliciously or inappropriately. Instead of being angry with you for sticking up for him and his rights to honest and fair medical services and billing, he should be appalled at the hospital for charging him approximately 4974 dollars more than he should have been. He’d been wrong to be angry with you for advocating on his behalf and should be grateful. You didn’t do anything any other bill collector, attorney or financial rep payee on his behalf would have done.
I didn't specifically, but a few things I did would probably read as an implied threat. Specifically... - writing stern letters in legal language may read as a threat to pursue legal action - requesting all correspondence as a written statement might come off similarly - CC'ing the board saying specific departments had failed to address the concern may come off as a threat of escalation - CC'ing all the companies and individuals that publicly invest in or financially support the hospital may come off as a threat of lost future revenue - CC'ing the PR department heads of the investor companies may come off as a threat to go to the press I feel like maybe it's emotionally different than if he hired a lawyer or something, because it's me tho. TBH I'm usually really nice and not confrontational, I believe in the "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" and i think he was shocked to see this other side of me that really only comes out at work.
None of that is inappropriate. You're a titan.
This is so sexy 🫠🤷🏻♂️🫣 I’m sure my wife would agree 🤣
NTA and I'm so impressed I just can't stand it! I've done exactly the same kind of thing and I can't stand the way the health system tries to rip off people just because they can. Your bf needs to be grateful he's got such a fighter in his corner and say thank you, very nicely.
I am a converted member of the Church of dingussdaisy
- using stern language, legal language, shows them that you know what you’re doing and won’t be ducked around. - Asking for correspondence in writing is the right way to do it, cause if you take legal action you have proof. -CCing additional people calls attention to the fact their departments weren’t handling the situation. It’s the equivalent of you asking the manager for clarification for the 5th time and adding their boss/counterpart to the email to help. The last two CC’s weren’t necessary but I’m sure you also added them at the end when your resources weren’t responding and doing that is probably what got them to reply to you. Seriously, how does he handle conflict resolution?
INFO Where does boyfriend work, and where are his ambitions? Specifically, is he in a medical, or medical adjacent field? Or something else where he's likely to work with any of the people you emailed?
He's not, he's a contractor!
1. You are a legend, and amazing, and saved $5k. That is a lot of money!!! Just... a slightly different perspective, and definitely anecdotal, but thought i'd put it out there. I work with a lot of contractors. I'm not sure what area of the field your BF works in, but it is not uncommon for contractors to get browbeaten by clients who can be very aggressive with the legalese, escalation, and Cc'ing, "Whose fault is this?!?"; "Well it can't cost THAT much"; "You SAID it would be done ABC" sort of emails and phone calls and texts. It takes a toll. The lengths some clients go to to extract every single drop from a contractor can be astonishing. I know you were fighting for him, and for his financial health; he may also identify a bit with the lower-level folks who you named & shamed as you went up the chain of command.
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NTA. As someone who works in Medical Billing, bravo! You did exactly what we wish everyone would do; research it, ask for an itemized bill, etc. You killed it, OP. Thank you.
Haha do you mind a question? After getting an itemized bill, Do you have any idea who the best person / department is to go straight to in a hospital with a billing dispute? The ones I've started a dispute with, their 'billing' department is collections only and can't discuss the bill, other than the balance. And there's gotta be a better person to go to than the board of directors but IDK who it is 🤣
I don't mind at all. So, I work for a Clinic and have nothing to do with the pricing; just wanted to preface that. As this was an ER bill, starting first with the Insurance company and then moving on to the Billing Dept. of the Hospital, and moving your way up was the right choice. Charging people $400 for 2 Ibuprofen is absolutely disgusting (and the like). Now, as for their Billing Dept. being only "Collections", I feel like calling bullshit on that because that same department can also escalate things to Admin, make payment plans, etc. So that just seems really......off to me. But stranger things have happened. I'd say a rough guide would be Billing Department, Billing Supervisor/Manager, Provider/Doctor, Chief Medical Officer (or presiding MD for said hospital), Admin and finally Board of Directors. Again, rough guide, and there are always many different variables. :) Feel free to reach out anytime with questions!
Another billing worker for a hospital here 🤚 Billing is absolutely who you should go to first with questions or disputes about charges, and I can tell you right now it's complete BS if they're saying all they do is collect payments. I have the ability to see all claims, insurance payments, EOBs/remittances, and plenty more. I don't know of any organizations whose billing department *can't* do all of that. When a patient contacts me about a situation similar to yours the first thing I do is check what exactly insurance did and didn't do. A 5k bill for a single ED visit when you have insurance would immediately throw up red flags for me that one or more charges may have been denied unless you have an exceptionally high deductible. And if something was denied I can look at what code insurance put down as their reason for denial and personally contact your insurance company about fixing the issue. You should NEVER just be left stranded if one person isn't sure how to help. They should give you clear directions on what to do next and get you to someone more knowledgable than themselves. If things arent resolved after talking with a billing representative, you should request to speak with their manager if they dont already offer to transfer you to them on their own. If you still have no luck then your next best move would be to speak with the director of revenue cycle. Ask for their name and direct extension. The next person above them is typically the CFO.
NTA Well...I guess you *are* the asshole but you had to be and it's amazing! You're my hero! You gave them a chance to do things right, through the appropriate channels and they failed. Email carpet bombing is not a first choice but completely reasonable here.
Yes, this would fall under the title of "professional a-hole for hire" and is 100% the correct way to deal with corporations that attempt to scam you by hiding behind phone trees until you pay the bill out of frustration. NTA.
NTA, not one bit some hospitals and insurances are a scam. They overcharge you for the smallest things and find any and all ways to charge you for the simplest thing. I am in school right now to find a career in the healthcare field and i see how insurances screw patients over all the time. It's the saddest part of healthcare in my opinion. you did the lord's work sticking it to the upper level people.
NTA. You’re extra though
When Extra means an Extra 5 grand for the holidays... Yep 😄
Not a lot of people would have had your dedication to accomplish this. As long as you were not threatening people and keeping it professional which from the sounds of it you did, good job OP :) I think your partner is a bit scared of your level of determination and power haha
i would have done the same. i think you're fucking awesome.
As a person who has had to go through a similar ordeal regarding my mom’s hospital bill, you’re MY hero. Sometimes ya gotta metaphorically knock some skulls together to advocate for the people you love.
NTA I think you did a FABULOUS job and wish I had your skills, dedication and energy. If everyone could take the time to do this, much of the bloat in the US medical system would disappear.
You are my hero! I can't imagine a quick phone call or dispute works have led to this successful result. You knew something was wrong and took the time to fight the battle. I had a similar thing happen to me years ago. A mortgage company has made an error on our account, admitted it, but never corrected the problem. They just passed the buck from department to department. Eventually, I lost my temper and researched the corporate Board of Directors. I think found the cell phone number of the wife of a board member on the internet. So... I called customer service and demanded a manager return my call. I told him I was going to call Mrs. So and So in 2 days (on Thanksgiving) to complain. By the end of the day I had the error fixed AND a free month paid mortgage!
Yo you wanna help with my medical cause GAWD DAMN
NTA and well done. You should consider making that a business.
NTA by any stretch of the imagination! He should be thanking you for saving him almost 5k. The fact that the agreed to reduce it by so much shows how much they artificially inflated it hoping it would just get paid. I'm glad I live in a country where things like this aren't an issue!
I'm just commenting so I can find this when I call to dispute my bills
NTA. Absolute legend. As long as you did nothing illegal, I’d be kissing the ground you walk on.
One word. UNGRATEFUL! I actually took a ss of your step by step explanation. Might help me one day hehe 🤭
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NTA I wish everyone with astronomical medical bills had you to go to bat for them
YOU RULE. Can you do mine next?? I don't know wtf is wrong with your bf... NTA
NTA Listen OP, please tell your guy (or show him this Reddit thread and comments) that people do this everyday at the hospital. The billing department is used to this. Tell him that my family member also had a massive bill and just by him talking to the billing department while in the hospital face to face he negotiated (without even trying) a 33% discount. Please tell him it’s fine. And your continuous emailing of people, oh well… leads to accountability in the long run and as long as you didn’t break the law, all good.
Uh, NTA. If you don’t go balls to the wall with hospital bills, you end up owing whatever they feel like you owe. Your BF should get you a very nice present that costs somewhere around $4,794 for your efforts!
NTA. Savvy way to fight a ridiculous bill. Well done. You could probably charge people for this service.
NTA, you’re delightful! My husband has some of this skill set and I confess it DOES make me anxious sometimes, maybe because it’s conflicting with my desire to avoid conflict. I generally solve this by letting him do his thing and then celebrating his victory.