Damn Dental Visit.....

[kiki02]

Dc had a cleaning and X-ray and the office sent me a bill for over $315. Crazy nuts of a bill and although they have my insurance # and info (of which this is fully covered one time per year) they continue to bill me saying my insurance is not up to date. I call, I write, I get no where. I'm so fed up. Is there an office aside from the BBB that oversees this in NY?

Thanks all. What a mess.

 

[mikehn]

I completely sympathize. The worst part of a dental visit isn't the root canal, its the billing. And they love to upsell you with everything. It is possible that your insurance company issued you a different membership/policy number from the number you had last year. My insurance changes numbers from year to year. So the first thing is to make sure your policy number didn't change since last year.

 

[Eastern]

Call your insurance company first.

 

[kymom99]

My son's dentist billed under my SSN once which resulted in a rejected claim. I carried the dental at one time but not for years. It is under my husband's insurance now. We finally got to the bottom of it.

 

[Jeff_G]

I have switched dentists over billing issues.

We might be doing the same with the wife's regular DR.
Every single visit they bill her insurance, her insurance sends them a check, then they send us a bill saying they never got paid. We call the insurance company and obtain the check number, then call the out of state billing department for the DR giving them the check number. Then a few days later they miraculously find the payment. So annoying, once or twice I would understand but its every single time. I wonder how many people over pay.

This all started when the Dr practice was bought out by the large university medical system in our city.

 

[Lucky4me]

Medical billing has become an impossible nightmare all the way around. I found thousands of dollars of mistakes when dh had cancer. I know not everyone even looks at their bills, I can imagine how many go unnoticed.

As far as dentists? You have to be very careful. The field is filled with scammers these days. With better dental hygiene, they are not needed as much, so some have resorted to shady practices to make money.

I found this out seeking second opinions on work I needed. More than once. One dentist said I needed a root canal and a crown on a perfectly good tooth to the tune of $1800. It was a small cavity that needed filling, that was it.

Another said my gums were receding and I needed some expensive procedure. I didn't. I finally found one who only treats what is truly wrong and has reasonably priced cleanings. I never told the new dentists what the original ones said I needed, but I did write letters to the BBB about the first dentists. It is astounding they do this and get away with it.

 

[Dean1953]

I have all of my dental work done out of the country. Much cheaper and you actually see the dentist, not the assistants.

 

[MomToOne]

Oye. Dental/medical bills. Nightmare city.

Other PPs were right. First, verify the insurance information (again) that the office is billing - don't let them brush you off, verify each and every piece of information they use to bill. Then contact your HR and verify that is the latest information. Then contact your insurance company to see if any claims have been filed. Once the insurance pays out you should get an Explanation of Benefits (EOB) from the insurance company stating what they paid and what you owe - if you don't get one, something has probably broken down somewhere.

My most recent horror story: I had a dentist bill recently that I paid as soon as they sent me the bill. 2 months later I get a "final notice" on a slightly different amount, a few dollars less, with a threatening note that they were about to send me to collections. I called the dentist's office to ask what it was for (there was no indication on the bill they sent - don't get me started on that one!). They stated it was for the work I had already paid for - but why the amount had now changed, no one could explain (seeing a pattern here yet?). Then I told them "I already paid the bill for that procedure a few days after you sent me the bill in July - I'm staring at an image of the cancelled check right now". Their answer? "NO YOU DIDN'T." I swear, that is exactly what the billing person said. Not, "oh let's see what's going on". Not, "I don't have a record of that". Just "No you didn't". After faxing the cancelled check and pushing them to research it, they finally discovered they had put the payment on my daughter's account instead of mine. At that point, they didn't apologize for their mistake or their attitude or anything, just left me a message "your account is now up to date". Umm...it never wasn't!!!! And this is with a dentist I have a long history with, lots of work done the last 5 years, never a late payment. I am a GOOD patient for this practice. But their attitude on this incident definitely has me thinking of leaving.