I'm SO angry! I guess you live and learn

[sunni]

Originally posted by Nancy
Wow I could have used this help a few years ago! I had bills from lab work that was never paid because they never billed my insurance....by the time I found out it was too late for my claims to be processed...I shelled out lots of money.

Is that normal? I've received notices here and there over the years from our health insurance company when a lab or dr office submits a bill to my ins co too late to be covered. The notice always states why it isn't being paid by the ins. co. and that I am not obligated to pay it either. We haven't had bad credit for not paying them. Is it laws in different states that make the difference? Or the type of insurance coverage you have?

 

[Bobbles]

Originally posted by Nancy
Wow I could have used this help a few years ago! I had bills from lab work that was never paid because they never billed my insurance....by the time I found out it was too late for my claims to be processed...I shelled out lots of money.

Same exact thing happened with my DW. (Oh I guess that means me too! HA HA!)

How is it they can not send us a bill (that we can remember) but turn it over so quick to a collection agency and ruin your entire credit report?

(It's a longer story than I care to talk about right now.)

 

[WebmasterAlex]

Face it.. they make their threats and they know that 50 percent of the people will pay without a fight. Since they are already out the money what do they have to lose. There are all kinds of consumer protection laws and the whole collection agency industry is known for flaunting them. It's already on your credit report you have nothing to lose by fighting them.

 

[oogieboogie]

Unfortunately 99.9% of consumers do not know that they have rights covered under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. A lot of collection agencies use threats or repossession, lawsuits, prison time against these consumers. And sometimes, it's not even their debt but someone's whose name is the same as the person being threatened.

Picantel (my DH) got into helping other people because this happened to us. We found things in our credit report that was put there by the credit bureaus/collection agencies and turns out it wasn't even our debt.

Like Alex said, once it's on your credit report, there's nothing to lose. Heck, even when it isn't on your report yet, there's nothing to lose.