Why is it, that sometimes it's so difficult to get small things taken care of???
I'll bet you're glad to have that behind you now, Bones! Took 'em long enough!!
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I've been going through something similar with my MIL's medical bills. She had Medicare and also a secondary health insurance. All that information was included in the packet of test results and records that the local ER sent along with her to the big-city hospital. The ER nurse assured me that everything we could possibly need was included in that envelope, because of course I worried about the insurance info.
We started to receive medical bills - payable immediately, of course - indicating a balance due that Medicare didn't cover. I freaked out at first... and then remembered the second insurance. A phone call that relayed that insurance info seemed to take care of it. Well no, everyone bills separately, so there've been several more. Now I just pick up the phone... and it's not a big deal - just a detail that needs to be taken care of, you know? Twice, the medical office in question had received payment on the very same day they mailed the bill that I held in my hot little frustrated hands!! (There has to be a better way to deal with this "office work" side of this - it would save so many hours of labor and tons of impact on emotional families...)
I'm pretty anal about administrative details - crossing t's and dotting i's - so my hubs' and his brother's "whatever" attitude about getting their executor role set up and things taken care of, in short order - is starting to make me crazy. True - this estate is way simpler and extremely straightforward, compared to my Dad's and the court processes do take time; nothing to do but wait. But, I know MIL would be about as nuts as I am about details and moving ahead.
Sorry for babbling on about myself... but you're not the only one wondering how things EVER get done in business or healthcare, as inefficient, uncommunicative, and flat-out incompetent all the different people who are supposed to and have to work together - are in different places.
Oooohhhhhh, I know all too well about those bureaucratic headaches!
To share my own experience.....(it's long!)
Before NWomb-Donor died, she was in a nursing home that was being paid for by Medicare and Medicaid. Whenever any patient had to be transported from the nursing home to the hospital a few blocks away, the nursing home staff would contact the ambulance service they contracted with. After the ambulance service transported the patient, the ambulance service company would send the bill to the patient's Medicare/Medicaid and the bill would be paid by Medicare/Medicaid. This was how my NWomb-Donor's medical care was handled until the day she died. Then things took a WEIRD twist.
With her final illness, she was transported to the nearby hospital by the ambulance service on a Friday or a Saturday, (can't remember which day it was). She slipped into a coma on Sunday and died on Monday, (with me being the only family member at her deathbed). With her death, the hospital and doctors involved are aware that they have only a finite amount of time to submit the final medical bills for payment before Medicare/Medicaid permanently closes the file, (I'm guesstimating about three to six months). The hospital got paid for and the doctors got paid for. About a YEAR AND FEW MONTHS AFTER HER DEATH, I received a letter from a collection agency threatening to sue me over the ambulance service bill!!! (WTF?!?!?) I called the collection agency to get to the bottom of what was going on.
The collection agency person, who answered the phone, stated that since my name was included in NWomb-Donor's records, the ambulance service was going to sue me for non-payment! I explained that the only reason my name was on any of her records was to give consent for treatments, nothing more. I emphasized that I had NEVER signed ANYTHING accepting responsibility for paying any of her outstanding medical bills and explained that she had been on Medicare and Medicaid for SEVERAL DECADES. The ambulance service had been sending their bills to Medicare and Medicaid all along and I was confused about why the ambulance service had not done so at the time of her death. That made the collection agency person pause and he asked me if he could put me on hold for a few minutes and I agreed. A short while later, the collection agency person came back on the line and told me the following theory: The ambulance service had waited TOO LONG to submit the final bills to NWomb-Donor's Medicare and Medicaid. By then, her file had been closed for several months. When the ambulance service got their request for payment rejected by Medicare and Medicaid, they immediately turned it over to the collection agency claiming that I owed the bill now. (The ambulance service NEVER contacted me! Apparently, they were attempting to "cover their a$$!) The collection agency person also theorized that the ambulance service assumed that I would be too grief-stricken to catch on to their scam. I commented that the ambulance service picked the WRONG person! Between the collection agency and myself, we decided that the ambulance service would be sent a strongly-worded letter about what they attempted to do and that I was NEVER responsible for this bill! The ambulance service was basically being told to EAT THEIR MISTAKE!
At the end of that conversation, I commented to the collection agency person that if this ambulance service ever attempted to sue me, again, over their own screw-up, I would counter-sue! He stated that he would gladly be my witness in court!!!! (He was outraged about what these idiots tried to do! Sheesh!) I never heard from that ambulance service ever again!
Bones
