SOS: Speaking of Seniors - Over $1700 in Savings

On November 17, 2015, I received a copy of a medical bill for a senior citizen client who lives in Kouts, Indiana. The bill was for $1,702.92.

I suspected that the bill was false. I phoned the client and made a three way call with her to both Medicare and her insurance company. We requested copies of all Medicare Summary Notice forms that might relate to the bill. But, also, I questioned both the insurance company representative and the Medicare representative about the details that she could see in her records about the medical bill. According to the Medicare representative and the client’s insurance company representative, the balance that our client owed should be ZERO.

On that day, I wrote to the medical billing firm to tell them to correct the bill and send our client a bill with a balance of zero. Instead, in December, the firm sent a bill to our client for a revised balance of $104.84. That was a false bill, too. So, On December 21, I wrote another letter to the medical billing firm in which I told them that their medical billing was either sloppy and incompetent or fraudulent. I told them that the correct balance was still ZERO and that if they did not immediately send a revised bill to our client that showed a balance of ZERO, I would help our client to file a complaint against the billing firm with the Medicare Inspector General. Less than a week later, our client got a statement showing that the balance was ZERO.

A few days later, I got a copy of the ZERO BALANCE bill from the client with a thank you note. Her note closed with this: “Just want you to know I sincerely appreciate what you have done for me. Maybe with the attention you brought to my bill, it will help some other senior avoid a medical bill scam.”

All the help that I gave this client was FREE OF CHARGE. This insurance agency distinguishes itself from others by “going the extra mile” to help our clients avoid financial harm when there is a problem with the Medicare system. Does your insurance agency give this high level of service to its senior citizen customers? If not, why not?