Billing Warrior

My goal is to keep my cool writing this blog. When it comes to health insurance, my vocabulary usually breaks down to four letter words. Used often and loudly. I have had such issues dealing with health insurance, billing and errors through the years that the second there is any issue – I get frustrated (read….irate) very quickly.

Prior to getting married, I had health insurance but always with limited coverage and huge deductibles. It is very difficult starting out as a young professional to get health insurance. I had hurt my credit ratings from simple bills for basic dental care and basic health issues. Fortunately, was able to get the bills under control on my own and start to increase my credit ratings. It took only 2 small bills over a couple of months to ruin my reputation with creditors and it took about six to seven years to clear it up.

Through the past six years I’ve had quite a lot of minor health issues and then some pretty major infertility issues. We have paid about $10,000 out of pocket through the years. Let’s just say that Max is really a miracle to us. I have found out through this process that you need to read EVERY line of EVERY bill. Errors can be made in billing, coding, double billing, double billing for service AND locations. It is really difficult to stay on top of everything. We have found errors that could have cost us thousands of dollars if they were not caught.

I am really sick of the whole process. Really. I wish I didn’t have to be a billing warrior going into battle with these huge companies. We PAY for our insurance, we work very hard, in general we are fairly healthy and we still are struggling with making ends meet with our insurance. So, no wonder I go crazy when I see a new bill or a new error or a new question. It feels like you are alone on an uphill battle. Hopefully, we can get a better health insurance plan in the next couple of years. That will really help us move forward.