Damn you, HIMYM creators/writers/producers. Damn you all to hell.
Funny how every time you have car problems, you have trouble coming up with the money to fix it. Yet youâve got money to buy cigarettes, gamble, take trips to gamble, buy drugs and drink alcohol.
No, you didnât assume it was Out of Network and what was left over was my responsibility. This is your MO. This is why people feel like their dental care and health care insurance companies are screwing them over. No, itâs not that my insurance company didnât pay the rest of your fee. On the contrary, youâre contractually obligated to be paid at a lower price and to honor it, but your poaching on people who donât know this or how it all works. As far as the EOB states, your contracted price has been paid in full and then some. Fix your âmistakeâ and pay me back.
TL;DR: In Network Dental office overcharged me on date of service, then proceeded to bill me for the rest of their Usual and Customary Rate (minus the insurance payment). This poaching appears to be the standard operating procedure for this office.
Soapbox Note: Most people donât know how their Insurance works and lots of offices know this and some take advantage of it. It wouldnât surprise me if this office has done this to other people and they just pay them blindly because the bill appeared in their mailbox. Unfortunately, itâs only able to be regulated if members recognize how insurance works and when their provider is not abiding by the contract. The Insurance company canât do anything unless members report any problems they see immediately.
Often itâs not the insurance company screwing people, itâs the providers. People who pick a dentist or other provider because itâs close to a Chiplotle they like to go to for lunch are just as bad as the ones who pick a mechanic based on the paint job on his tow truck.
Not many people can read an EOB correctly, and even working in the industry if I have a hospital claim it takes me forever to figure out who I owe what. And Dental is the red headed stepchild of insurance. When it should be the easiest thing ever to manage.
What does that make vision care?
The blind leading the blind?
Sorry, couldnât resist. 
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Thanks, @TechnoMistress. I needed a laugh this morning. 
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Vision insurance is pretty straightforward. Notice how you can walk out knowing exactly what you owe for everything? Hey, you have X insurance, here is your total payment, and the cost of these extras.
Yeah, you owe literally almost everything.
I think I get a $100 allowance every 2 years or some BS like that. That doesnât even cover my lenses (which, BTW, I have to get replaced annually). Oh, you want LASIK so that you never have this recurring cost again? Nope, not covered at all (long-term vs. short-term outlook is ignored there).
I get pretty kickass vision coverage, and I pump up my FSA to make up teh difference. Most vision plans have an allowance, and a discount.
In my personal opinion, after years working the group health benefits industry, you get more bang for your buck out of a good vision and dental plan than for a good medical plan.
Awesome medical benefits cost an arm and a leg, but awesome dental and vision is a fraction of the cost. And in a family of 5 you might not always use that medical benefit beyond physicals and colds, but you are hammering that dental plan and walking out of the dentist after paying $20 for a visit is golden, or getting glasses with just a copay. To get a Cadillac plan on Medical you could be paying over $750 a month for coverage, for Vision you donât even top $100.
Or put an HRA/HSA in place and fund the first $500 in there. Before Obamacare, FSAâs were the best employee benefit, but with the $2,500 limit and no OTC items now itâs not as useful, and that was a real strike against the middle class.
I am thankful for our (still no deductible, still only $100 a month for me + laura both) Boeing employee health insurance.
Really Yankees? Pine tar? What is this, the 1940s?? I hate the Red Sox too, but Iâd be pissed if the Tigers or the Tribe resorted to cheatingâŚ
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If youâre going to walk into the street to approach people in their cars at an intersection to beg for money, at least time it so youâre not still telling your story about why your begging for money when the light turns green. Theyâre not going to have time at that point to fish some money out of a purse or wallet because the drivers behind them are going to be impatient to go.
The sensation of the boat moving under me has passed.
Newark Liberty International is a wonderful airport.
It took a week for me to stop brushing up against things because I was tilting.
A friend of mine apparently decided to shuffle herself off the mortal coil over the weekend. We werenât particularly close, but Iâd known her since high school and she did have a history of mental problems which I (and others) thought were being handled rather well with her medications.
That being said:
I wish I could say I feel anything about this. I honestly donât feel anything. I canât even bring myself to be angry at her for leaving her child without a mother. And itâs not that numb feeling people describe while theyâre processing a lossâŚitâs just âmeh, another dead humanâ. Iâve felt the exact same way for the last 4 people that I knew who died.
I wonder if Iâm more broken than I thought I was.
The Army provides laser corrective surgery to soldiers routinely now, but you have to have at least one year left on your contract. Since Iâm active duty Nasty Guard, I get the same medical benefits as active dutyâtheoretically. In practice, since my active duty orders are always one FY at a time, I can never have a full year left on my active duty period, and so can never qualify for corrective surgery under the new rules. Iâve been active duty, with a total of two months of breaks, since January 2003, but Iâm not considered a good investment that way.
I have this conversation yearly with my eye doctor, right before they order me new glasses.
Something similar is happening with my teeth, which are not in great condition. There are some things they just wonât consider because youâre less than a year from leaving. Ironically, this could become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I think thatâs a lot of the reasoning behind not covering LASIK at regular companies also. Itâs not like they can cover it and force you to stay there for 5 years. Yes, over a 20 year career it more than pays for itself. But people donât have 20 year careers anymore. At 3-5k per surgery, and $300-500 a year in glasses, at most, thatâs a while to pay for itself for most companies.
And vision insurance that covers LASIK would cost a fortune, so it would likely be a self funded option coming directly out of operating funds on a random basis, and if it was covered wouldnât you get it for the whole family? One $10 an hour employee with three 20+ year old kids and a wife could cost more in LASIK than they do in pay.
Besides, if it was covered under insurance it wouldnât keep getting cheaper, it would get more expensive like everything else insurance covers. (That horse isnât quite dead yet, and Iâll keep beating it)
The thing is, even if I were not on active duty, Iâd still be in the Guard and still be deployable; my ETS date is 2018, so itâs not like Iâm just going to skip out. When and if we mobilize again, the first thing they will do is give me the damned laser surgery. In the mean time, the office at Madigan that does it sits idle because they donât have qualified people left to do it on.
Iâm planning to pay for it on the economy out of pocket later this year, depending on certain other events. Tired of waiting, and I can probably get a better procedure elsewhere anyway.
My wifeâs PRK was $3,500 all inclusive. We paid it out of our Flex plans, so tax free at least.