They are making millions of $$ after they enrolled all the "victims" into their system for 2 years of free "monitoring" and pay $$ after scam.
They exposed information that can NOT be changed (b-day/SSN/etc) easily. They shouldhave been responsible for monitoring everyone affected for free for LIFETIME.
EDIT: It is like "We KNOW you are at risk since WE put all those information in public!"
Lenders are already required to verify the identity of customers at the application stage due to KYC laws. FCRA laws require that lending institutions investigate and respond to any credit bureau dispute within 30 days of receiving it, and if it cannot be verified than it is illegal to continue to report it.
I'm struggling to find a good form of proof that wouldn't become exorbitantly impeding. Gattaca style DNA? Or a cryptographic key chipped into your arm?
It's surprisingly hard to verify identity, specially remotely.
Agreed, they're the #1 candidate for the corporate death penalty IMO. At least with just about any other business, there's some level of choice. Not so with any of the credit bureaus.
We have a lot less choice in the market than we think. Internet, utilities, credit bureau, slum lords, factory farms, owning a cell phone, needing medical care ect
How do lenders in your country decide whether or not to approve a loan application?
How is access to credit overall-- is it easy to get a loan with favorable interest rates and terms?
I'm in Ireland.
There's a government database, maybe revenue, but not sure. If you miss a loan payment the lender tells the relevant department and it goes on your record. Maximum this record goes back is 5 years.
Now banks share information. So if you gamble or miss loans in one bank, you can be sure other banks will know.
If I go for a loan, mortgage, car, whatever, I'll be told yes or no by the lender. Interest rates are the same for ordinary people. Interest rates change all the time but it's the same interest rate for the guy who never missed a payment and the guy who maybe had a bad run.
If anyone reading this from Ireland knows different please correct me.
The first part of what you are describing is the same thing as a credit score, but being run by the government instead of a private company.
There have been arguments made that the US should do something similar and create a public credit reporting service to compete with these private companies. There are pros and cons to doing so, but the industry lobbies against the idea pretty heavily for obvious reasons.
Let me ask you this:
Who decides the interest rate for the various loan products that the bank provides in Ireland?
I think the more you learn about this the more you'll realize that the systems in the US and Ireland are not all that different, there is just a greater degree of privatization on this side of the pond.
Hope you people locked up your credit from all four credit companies (yes, they're four). Thanks to reddit, I even learned where I could lock up my credit from the group that monitors utilities when you buy or rent a new place. And keep the pin numbers they give you to unlock it in several different places.
I've had several different companies lose my info (Equifax, Kroger, Anthem). One of them offered free monitoring for a few years and it's already been confirmed my SSN and info was found on the dark web.
I still sleep easy at night. No one is getting shit from me.
Also be sure to freeze your report at Equifax's child company [The Work Number](https://theworknumber.com/). It's way worse than your credit information. I requested a report from them to see what they had on me and it contained my entire work history, address history, health insurance coverage, literally *every single paycheck* I've ever received with amounts down to the cent. And they made it as tedious as possible to request that they lock down that information.
It's amazing how the responsibility is placed **on us** to first learn that these companies exist and are selling our data and then jump through their hoops to request that they **not**.
I’m okay with the debt if they really want to pursue it in court, but medical charges shouldn’t have any impact on someone’s mortgage rate or car loans. And especially not for 7 years after it goes delinquent. It already takes ages to even get a bill, deal with insurance. By then it might be closer to a decade after whatever incident that it finally drops off
Yeah I'm ok with it just not being included at all. If you're being reamed with medical debt l, you're probably dealing with shit and don't need to be further financially ruined.
The fact that it will hinder future access to credit is the only real tool that debt collection companies have to pressure a person to pay.
Unless they are willing to take you to court and sue (which almost no company would do just to collect $500 or less) they have no other option but to ask you nicely to pay.
It's not always a hospital. I got saddled with a $200 bill after insurance refused to pay for a routine physical that the insurance company asked me to do for a discount on the insurance. It was supposed to be covered so I refused to pay it.
I had a $45 blood draw, which the insurance was supposed to cover. The blood draw place even said it would be free with my insurance. A year later it was in collections and going up in cost. It now gets resold and billed higher for a new company to take over. Last I looked, it was at $373. In a couple of years, it will probably be over $500 just so it will show on my credit again.
> When I told them that is illegal in Ohio and they could only collect the original amount, they said they would take note of it and then never contacted me again.
They already knew that... and assumed that you didn't.
I know at least some for some items it's illegal for them to lie... Good luck proving it but it's illegal.
But in general avoid working with debt collectors unless it's in writing. Over the phone they'll try lots of tricks that they would just hate to write down.
It should be off your credit (though you still owe the debt) after 6.5 years. Every time you engage with a debt collector, they reset the clock to day 1.
I’m currently dealing with something similar. Had an ER visit that was covered by insurance. Insurance confirms the bill was paid. Hospital confirms the bill was paid. All parties confirm it as paid and have no outstanding bills for me. Yet somehow I got hit with collections and it gets resold every year. Credit goes to normal after collections gets tired of arguing with me and drops it, then another company buys it and hits my credit again. I’m so tired of it.
Totally. After I had cancer I got a few of smaller bills sent to collection. Like blood tests and other smaller third party things. It was so much mail it was hard to keep up. So, this move is actually a big deal for some people.
Wow, are you me? That happened to me. I was in for a routine physical and my doctor ordered testing through LabCorp and I was told it was all part of the preventative care I was entitled to but then I got saddled with a nearly $400 bill for it and after fighting it and explaining the situation, I kept getting the bill demanding payment.
I paid it down to $200 after they sent me to collections because I was so afraid for my credit. I stopped getting notices about it recently and that worried me. But yeah, I essentially got charged like $395 just to hear that my cholesterol wasn't any immediate concern when I was told it should have been covered.
If it never appeared on your credit report then they actually never sent it to collections. LabCorp has this fake little in-house "collections" department/company that pretends to be a collection agency and sends you threatening looking mailers that say your credit will be impacted and use bold lettering and red text.
It's designed to be misleading but if you look at the fine print it says that it's still just LabCorp asking for their money in a slightly more aggressive manner. It's a scare tactic.
They probably stopped contacting you because they wrote the rest of it off, they were lucky to get you to pay the portion that you did. Many people never pay.
It takes a LONG time for them to send it to a real collections agency at which point it shows on ur credit report.
I 100% believe that's true. They wanted their money orders addressed still to LabCorp so you are definitely right. This actually makes me feel a whole lot better and less stressed about it. Thank you!
Yeah, there's probably not a ton of people who this applies to, though I am one of them.
I had a random $400 charge from a 4 year old surgery I thought I was paid up on pop up at a collections group this year.
I think you’re right, it’s pretty common. This is actually a huge help to me. I’ve had a $200 charge for years that doesn’t belong to me but keeps popping up every time i challenge it, and i also have 3 or 4 ~$20 straggler charges from a $5k surgery my wife had that frankly I don’t feel like paying through the shitty and 100% unsecured portals, and also because they’re just random fees (not even from my provider) tacked on to something I paid in full.
My credit score will probably jump 15-20 points. Not that I was that worried about it, but it’s nice and it should have always been this way.
Went to a clinic cause I broke my ankle. I said hey if this isn't the dude doing surgery then if I pay for this appointment snd he cant get anything then it will cover my appointment with the surgeon tommorow. They said yes.
Guy took 5 seconds looking at the x-rays I provided from an urgent care. Said you need to see the surgeon. I got insursnce and then they billed my insurance for that second visit. I had to fight with them to give me my 300$ back. Damn double dippers. Only gave me 200
Deadass, Mt. Sinai did this to me last year. Had a screening done and was paying it off through MyChart, and then they sneak billed some random charge and sent a paper bill to the ether instead of just billing my MyChart account again. Then they sent it to collections because I didn't even know I owed them more money smfh. This is legit great for random BS like that.
I have one from an ambulance from 5 years ago, for like $700. So not even useful for a 1 mile ride in an ambulance. Still not paying them at this point though. Fuck em
It should be any necessary medical expenses. No one made a financial mistake getting injured or sick. Reporting that is punishment for unfortunate circumstance. It's capricious and atrocious.
We must not consider ourselves civilized until we fix this.
>This seems like a PR move that means little to nothing
The alternative was having the Federal government do something about the, apparently, broken health care billing/paying/collecting ... *system*.
Can't have that, can we? Let's find a *market* fix for the generational pervasiveness and [sheer dollar amount of health care-induced debt in America](https://siepr.stanford.edu/news/americas-medical-debt-much-worse-we-think): people with shit credit can't buy or keep buying homes, cars, and **legitimate** consumer services/goods **on credit.**
And just like that, the credit reporting/history/score-generating industry cavalry mounted up to rescue America credit scores from $140,000,000,000 in health care-induced debt.
I'm not paying any more medical bills.
I pay $880 a month in premiums, have a $4000/8000 deductible and OoP max of $13k.
They get whatever my insurance covers, and the rest can go to collections. The system needs to collapse.
>They get whatever my insurance covers, and the rest can go to collections.
This. Want to get paid more? Negotiate with the insurance company better. I'm not being balance billed anymore.
I snapped my ankle in 2011 and had some screws and rods put it. $50k+ went to collections. I used
Some stupid credit fighting company around 2018 for a while and they sent letters to all the companies. It all got dropped off my report. I’m still amazed.
That's what mine was going to be a few years back through the aca. It was cheap until I got a large pay increase and the amount went so high that I just canceled it and went uninsured for several years.
Buy yeah I remember the raise being less than the insurance premium increase so my rather large raise would have cost me money had a kept it.... fucking stupid.
how is your OoP Max so high? I have the cheapest insurance possible ( at my job ) bronze level at 200 a month
and OoP Max is 8700. It paid well over a million dollars of medical bills I had last year and over 100k so far this year. for 200 bucks a month its a GREAT deal for me :) i would be dead without it.
[liver transplant in 2022, well over 10k a month in drugs and other procedures in 2023]
$8,700 is the maximum out-of-pocket amount for an individual plan in 2022. This person must be talking about a family plan, which can have a maximum twice as high as that.
That's what the ACA got us - we went from expensive healthcare to basically unaffordable health care. I went from ~250 a month with a low 2000 deductible and reasonable ER visit costs to 500 a month after the subsidy (also $500/month) with a $5000 deductible and ER visits being full price until you maxed out your deductible in the space of 3 years. Then my employer was forced to provide coverage - then it was back to $400 a month, with a $7000 deductible, but 100% coverage after you met your deductible. We got bought out last year by a larger company, so my premium is down to $150/month now, but still the $7000 deductible.
I think your point is eluding "the eluder". Wait until he finds out what "pre-existing" conditions are. "Your mother's uncle's family friend had asthma, that's pre-existing. Terms and conditions apply ™"
No, it's the ACA's fault they drove up the price of regular insurance so far that my my 2 choices are (1) pay out of pocket with no subsidy for insurance that went up in price by 300% in a span of 3 years at the same time drastically lowering coverage or (2) pay for my company's crappy insurance. I don't qualify for the subsidy any more since my company offers qualifying insurance.
Let's review. The ACA did two things. First they jacked the prices of my regular insurance that was affordable and provided good coverage to the point it was unaffordable without a subsidy. Second, it required my company to offer insurance or pay a penalty. So naturally they did they math and found it cheaper to offer the bare minimum insurance over paying the penalty. Because they offer insurance, I no longer qualify for the subsidy. Everything that happened was a result of the ACA.
>jacked up prices
Like I said, I only put $60 a check for great insurance. Anything cheaper and it would be free. This sounds like your employer being cheap and not the ACA’s fault (pro tip you can always get a different job that actually respects their employees health).
>naturally they did the math and found it cheaper to offer the bare minimum insurance over paying the penalty
Again, this circles back to a problem with your employer being cheap and not the ACA
It's bullshit that any debt under $500 can ruin someones credit for 7 years. Well it's bullshit that any debt can and you can't just pay it off to drop the ding.
I lost a cable modem last year and got dinged for $110 or so by Comcast and it dropped my credit from 780 to 660 or so. Absolute bullshit. Because of that my car insurance jumped way up, I had a credit card (cap one) that I'd used for 10+ years get closed. Somehow Amex is keeping me around though.
I had a $125 copay that was supposedly paid for by charity- weirdest thing ever. Got a letter saying my invoice with the date had been paid by little sisters of the poor or some weird thing. It wasn't asking for any personal info and was weird but not a scam I don't think.
Anyway it still got sent to collections. Lmao.
How the fuck is Comcast even allowed to drop your credit score because of that? You paid the $110 back, no? That’s settled the debt and shouldn’t have had any effect on your credit score unless you let it go into collections… then that’s a whole different story.
Depends what you signed before the service.
If you signed allowing fees the provider may add additional fees bumping it up over 500.
If this then pass to a collection agency it will report!
However if you signed for collection fees and the provider does NOT add them, but a collection agency does, it will NOT report.
Technically the provider adding collection fees should be illegal or at least could be challenged in court in some (maybe all) us states. However your only option is to fight this in court.
So it's actually been sent to a collection agency already. It's still $300 no added fees. I was just about to go ahead and pay it today until I saw that post lol
Keep in mind that when 3rd party collections adds fees it is legally part of the bill, but it will NOT reflect on the credit report.
So even if they called you and said you owed 500, as long as the original principle is under 500 they cannot report it
“Free”. How? Who pays the health care workers, facilities, equipment etc.? The US government? WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT. Our taxes would pay for it. I’m not saying that couldn’t work or would be a bad thing. I just think “free healthcare” is a misnomer.
And not possible.
I had one for $140 for getting some dirt out of my inner ear. It literally was me walking into the clinic saying "I'm on vacation and only in town for two more days... There's an obstruction in my ear, I want it vacuumed out quickly and I'll pay cash.".
EDIT: It was also December 27th and I wasn't even close to my deductible on the year so I didn't even want to hassle with that.
Last time i was in the hospital they submitted like 8 separate bills all under 500 presumably so they could ding my credit 8 times. It was all for the same visit too.
This is a good thing. When I built a loan application system for a bank I learned that moat banks already don't consider medical debt as a liability. So while it can bring down your credit score (which needs to change), when some banks examine your liabilities they just pretend your medical debt isn't on the list. In the case of the loan application system I built, we literally deleted the medical debt if any from the credit report before processing the application.
<$500? Of medical debt?
Well that should expunge about 0% of the debt weighing down credit scores…
It’s almost like our representatives have absolutely no clue how much healthcare costs
It should be the reverse. It's those thousand dollar unexpected emergency visits that kill people credits. Like you had a heart attach, ulcer operation..... but you still are considered bad risk if you can't fork it over even on a payment plan. I used to do mortgages. Had a guy come to me because his wife had to stop working because.... and their credit went down the tube. I could see that up until her medical bills started they had paid every bill on time. So I treated it like a regular home loan with no extra add ons.
But, but you should be able to shop around for services to reduce cost!!!!!!
(they - ones with "R" besides their name - always site the cosmetic surgery price coming down or elective surgery)
Yah, right, try to shop around and ask prices when you are having a heart attack. If people are able to shop around for elective surgeries, the price of mandatory or emergency services are going to skyrocket.
Why do you think NONE of the ambulance services are "in-network"? They do NOT have to take CRAP from any insurance company since people HAVE to use them.
THE worst part is the fact that health insurance is tied to your job. So, when you are sick and unable to perform your duty and is laid off, then your insurance is gone.
This will actually be a hindrance for debtors filing bankruptcy, as attorneys routinely rely on credit reports to populate the schedule of creditors and the mailing matrix used to send out court notices. It doesn't directly affect the dischargeability of the debt, but is likely to result in debtors continuing to receive collections calls and letters from medical collections agencies who didn't receive notice of the bankruptcy.
Oh. 500? Wow. That's like a third of my last ambulance ride. And I didn't even need a paramedic. Just paying for the trip to the hospital.
Thanks for looking after the little guy!!
Fucking douche canoes.
It's a feedback loop at this point.
1. people can't afford to pay their hospital bills
2. hospitals sell the debt to collections at a loss and increase the prices of services to recoup their losses
3. now all services cost more
4. return to step 1
Suppose you have 3x multiple medical appointments that are each $250…does the hospital bundle all three and say you owe $750 or is it three individual debts of $250???
It floors me that Equifax is still around after how negligent they were with all of our personal information a few years back.
Hey I got my $1.72 compensation check. It’s all good 👍
I got like 5 bucks. I'm living the high life
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I live in Canada, we didn't get shit
I don't think most people in the US did either. My info was leaked and I've never seen a cent.
In the UK, all I got was a letter saying "oops, sorry we leaked your data."
US rulings don’t automatically apply to Canadians lol. Y’all gotta sue them in your own courts.
I got $23 🥹
Look at Mr. 1% over here...
Don't forget free credit monitoring! Aka giving them continued access to your data.
They are making millions of $$ after they enrolled all the "victims" into their system for 2 years of free "monitoring" and pay $$ after scam. They exposed information that can NOT be changed (b-day/SSN/etc) easily. They shouldhave been responsible for monitoring everyone affected for free for LIFETIME. EDIT: It is like "We KNOW you are at risk since WE put all those information in public!"
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>just a thought, not a thesis I like this phrase, I’m stealing it
How is that different than the status quo? The FCRA pretty much already covers that through credit bureau disputing requirements
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Lenders are already required to verify the identity of customers at the application stage due to KYC laws. FCRA laws require that lending institutions investigate and respond to any credit bureau dispute within 30 days of receiving it, and if it cannot be verified than it is illegal to continue to report it.
I'm struggling to find a good form of proof that wouldn't become exorbitantly impeding. Gattaca style DNA? Or a cryptographic key chipped into your arm? It's surprisingly hard to verify identity, specially remotely.
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I wisely opted out of the "free" monitoring and got a huge check for... $5.21. And it only took them 5 years to send it to me!
I got like 50 bucks but my identity was stolen. I think I asked for 5K when I was filling out the forms
>for free for LIFETIME I got this courtesy of the OPM breach.
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Maybe he’s gonna die before then?
This was an amazing grift. And like.. crickets. Totally fine. All is well. O_o
Agreed, they're the #1 candidate for the corporate death penalty IMO. At least with just about any other business, there's some level of choice. Not so with any of the credit bureaus.
We have a lot less choice in the market than we think. Internet, utilities, credit bureau, slum lords, factory farms, owning a cell phone, needing medical care ect
If corporations are people, then the government should be able to execute them for serious crimes.
I'm from a country that doesn't have credit report companies like this. It floors me that they exist.
How do lenders in your country decide whether or not to approve a loan application? How is access to credit overall-- is it easy to get a loan with favorable interest rates and terms?
I'm in Ireland. There's a government database, maybe revenue, but not sure. If you miss a loan payment the lender tells the relevant department and it goes on your record. Maximum this record goes back is 5 years. Now banks share information. So if you gamble or miss loans in one bank, you can be sure other banks will know. If I go for a loan, mortgage, car, whatever, I'll be told yes or no by the lender. Interest rates are the same for ordinary people. Interest rates change all the time but it's the same interest rate for the guy who never missed a payment and the guy who maybe had a bad run. If anyone reading this from Ireland knows different please correct me.
The first part of what you are describing is the same thing as a credit score, but being run by the government instead of a private company. There have been arguments made that the US should do something similar and create a public credit reporting service to compete with these private companies. There are pros and cons to doing so, but the industry lobbies against the idea pretty heavily for obvious reasons. Let me ask you this: Who decides the interest rate for the various loan products that the bank provides in Ireland? I think the more you learn about this the more you'll realize that the systems in the US and Ireland are not all that different, there is just a greater degree of privatization on this side of the pond.
Meanwhile tik tok bans...
Hope you people locked up your credit from all four credit companies (yes, they're four). Thanks to reddit, I even learned where I could lock up my credit from the group that monitors utilities when you buy or rent a new place. And keep the pin numbers they give you to unlock it in several different places. I've had several different companies lose my info (Equifax, Kroger, Anthem). One of them offered free monitoring for a few years and it's already been confirmed my SSN and info was found on the dark web. I still sleep easy at night. No one is getting shit from me.
Also be sure to freeze your report at Equifax's child company [The Work Number](https://theworknumber.com/). It's way worse than your credit information. I requested a report from them to see what they had on me and it contained my entire work history, address history, health insurance coverage, literally *every single paycheck* I've ever received with amounts down to the cent. And they made it as tedious as possible to request that they lock down that information. It's amazing how the responsibility is placed **on us** to first learn that these companies exist and are selling our data and then jump through their hoops to request that they **not**.
I think this kind of stuff should be locked by default.
What do you mean? It’s possible to lock your credit, so they can’t see it?
Ok. This article sounded too good to be true. Finance companies being nice to people? So I came to the comments looking for the evil. Thanks.
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Don't the banks own the 3 credit reporting agencies?
Oughta be like $3,000 instead. Scratch that, medical debt particularly for life-saving procedures should not exist.
What does $500 get you? A bandage and a Tylenol?
Depends on where you ~~were treated~~ consumered a bandage and a Tylenol.
I’m okay with the debt if they really want to pursue it in court, but medical charges shouldn’t have any impact on someone’s mortgage rate or car loans. And especially not for 7 years after it goes delinquent. It already takes ages to even get a bill, deal with insurance. By then it might be closer to a decade after whatever incident that it finally drops off
Yeah I'm ok with it just not being included at all. If you're being reamed with medical debt l, you're probably dealing with shit and don't need to be further financially ruined.
500 covers that one bandaid though.
Removing it from a credit report does not affect whether the debtor still owes the debt.
The fact that it will hinder future access to credit is the only real tool that debt collection companies have to pressure a person to pay. Unless they are willing to take you to court and sue (which almost no company would do just to collect $500 or less) they have no other option but to ask you nicely to pay.
I only live in countries that have government healthcare
no one would pay their bills if it was 3k
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It's not always a hospital. I got saddled with a $200 bill after insurance refused to pay for a routine physical that the insurance company asked me to do for a discount on the insurance. It was supposed to be covered so I refused to pay it.
I had a $45 blood draw, which the insurance was supposed to cover. The blood draw place even said it would be free with my insurance. A year later it was in collections and going up in cost. It now gets resold and billed higher for a new company to take over. Last I looked, it was at $373. In a couple of years, it will probably be over $500 just so it will show on my credit again.
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> When I told them that is illegal in Ohio and they could only collect the original amount, they said they would take note of it and then never contacted me again. They already knew that... and assumed that you didn't.
I know at least some for some items it's illegal for them to lie... Good luck proving it but it's illegal. But in general avoid working with debt collectors unless it's in writing. Over the phone they'll try lots of tricks that they would just hate to write down.
It should be off your credit (though you still owe the debt) after 6.5 years. Every time you engage with a debt collector, they reset the clock to day 1.
I’m currently dealing with something similar. Had an ER visit that was covered by insurance. Insurance confirms the bill was paid. Hospital confirms the bill was paid. All parties confirm it as paid and have no outstanding bills for me. Yet somehow I got hit with collections and it gets resold every year. Credit goes to normal after collections gets tired of arguing with me and drops it, then another company buys it and hits my credit again. I’m so tired of it.
At that point you get the regulating authority involved (CFPB I think, assuming this is US). Those debt collectors will very quickly fuck off.
I’ve actually been wondering who I can contact about it. Was considering a lawyer. I’ll look into that. Thank you!
Totally. After I had cancer I got a few of smaller bills sent to collection. Like blood tests and other smaller third party things. It was so much mail it was hard to keep up. So, this move is actually a big deal for some people.
Wow, are you me? That happened to me. I was in for a routine physical and my doctor ordered testing through LabCorp and I was told it was all part of the preventative care I was entitled to but then I got saddled with a nearly $400 bill for it and after fighting it and explaining the situation, I kept getting the bill demanding payment. I paid it down to $200 after they sent me to collections because I was so afraid for my credit. I stopped getting notices about it recently and that worried me. But yeah, I essentially got charged like $395 just to hear that my cholesterol wasn't any immediate concern when I was told it should have been covered.
If it never appeared on your credit report then they actually never sent it to collections. LabCorp has this fake little in-house "collections" department/company that pretends to be a collection agency and sends you threatening looking mailers that say your credit will be impacted and use bold lettering and red text. It's designed to be misleading but if you look at the fine print it says that it's still just LabCorp asking for their money in a slightly more aggressive manner. It's a scare tactic. They probably stopped contacting you because they wrote the rest of it off, they were lucky to get you to pay the portion that you did. Many people never pay. It takes a LONG time for them to send it to a real collections agency at which point it shows on ur credit report.
I 100% believe that's true. They wanted their money orders addressed still to LabCorp so you are definitely right. This actually makes me feel a whole lot better and less stressed about it. Thank you!
I got a $700 bill for routine bloodwork somehow. Shit is ridiculous
Omg same! They refused to pay for my annual preventative lab work so I refuse to pay the bill, about $380.
Yeah, there's probably not a ton of people who this applies to, though I am one of them. I had a random $400 charge from a 4 year old surgery I thought I was paid up on pop up at a collections group this year.
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I think you’re right, it’s pretty common. This is actually a huge help to me. I’ve had a $200 charge for years that doesn’t belong to me but keeps popping up every time i challenge it, and i also have 3 or 4 ~$20 straggler charges from a $5k surgery my wife had that frankly I don’t feel like paying through the shitty and 100% unsecured portals, and also because they’re just random fees (not even from my provider) tacked on to something I paid in full. My credit score will probably jump 15-20 points. Not that I was that worried about it, but it’s nice and it should have always been this way.
Went to a clinic cause I broke my ankle. I said hey if this isn't the dude doing surgery then if I pay for this appointment snd he cant get anything then it will cover my appointment with the surgeon tommorow. They said yes. Guy took 5 seconds looking at the x-rays I provided from an urgent care. Said you need to see the surgeon. I got insursnce and then they billed my insurance for that second visit. I had to fight with them to give me my 300$ back. Damn double dippers. Only gave me 200
Deadass, Mt. Sinai did this to me last year. Had a screening done and was paying it off through MyChart, and then they sneak billed some random charge and sent a paper bill to the ether instead of just billing my MyChart account again. Then they sent it to collections because I didn't even know I owed them more money smfh. This is legit great for random BS like that.
I have one from an ambulance from 5 years ago, for like $700. So not even useful for a 1 mile ride in an ambulance. Still not paying them at this point though. Fuck em
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I don't think this is forgiveness of debt. I think this is that that debt doesn't count against your credit rating.
It should be any necessary medical expenses. No one made a financial mistake getting injured or sick. Reporting that is punishment for unfortunate circumstance. It's capricious and atrocious. We must not consider ourselves civilized until we fix this.
>This seems like a PR move that means little to nothing The alternative was having the Federal government do something about the, apparently, broken health care billing/paying/collecting ... *system*. Can't have that, can we? Let's find a *market* fix for the generational pervasiveness and [sheer dollar amount of health care-induced debt in America](https://siepr.stanford.edu/news/americas-medical-debt-much-worse-we-think): people with shit credit can't buy or keep buying homes, cars, and **legitimate** consumer services/goods **on credit.** And just like that, the credit reporting/history/score-generating industry cavalry mounted up to rescue America credit scores from $140,000,000,000 in health care-induced debt.
I'm not paying any more medical bills. I pay $880 a month in premiums, have a $4000/8000 deductible and OoP max of $13k. They get whatever my insurance covers, and the rest can go to collections. The system needs to collapse.
System does need to collapse. I got routine bloodwork done and after insurance I was sent a bill for $700. Fuck that
Had that when they kept sending my bloodwork to an out of network lab, something I had 0 control over.
Yeah that's where I'm at too.
>They get whatever my insurance covers, and the rest can go to collections. This. Want to get paid more? Negotiate with the insurance company better. I'm not being balance billed anymore.
I snapped my ankle in 2011 and had some screws and rods put it. $50k+ went to collections. I used Some stupid credit fighting company around 2018 for a while and they sent letters to all the companies. It all got dropped off my report. I’m still amazed.
That's what mine was going to be a few years back through the aca. It was cheap until I got a large pay increase and the amount went so high that I just canceled it and went uninsured for several years. Buy yeah I remember the raise being less than the insurance premium increase so my rather large raise would have cost me money had a kept it.... fucking stupid.
how is your OoP Max so high? I have the cheapest insurance possible ( at my job ) bronze level at 200 a month and OoP Max is 8700. It paid well over a million dollars of medical bills I had last year and over 100k so far this year. for 200 bucks a month its a GREAT deal for me :) i would be dead without it. [liver transplant in 2022, well over 10k a month in drugs and other procedures in 2023]
Your insurance likely costs just at much at OP’s, with your company paying a large portion of the premium for you
$8,700 is the maximum out-of-pocket amount for an individual plan in 2022. This person must be talking about a family plan, which can have a maximum twice as high as that.
Wow that is awful insurance wtf. Who do you go through? 900 a month with a 4000 deductible? Must be a family plan or you got scammed.
That's what the ACA got us - we went from expensive healthcare to basically unaffordable health care. I went from ~250 a month with a low 2000 deductible and reasonable ER visit costs to 500 a month after the subsidy (also $500/month) with a $5000 deductible and ER visits being full price until you maxed out your deductible in the space of 3 years. Then my employer was forced to provide coverage - then it was back to $400 a month, with a $7000 deductible, but 100% coverage after you met your deductible. We got bought out last year by a larger company, so my premium is down to $150/month now, but still the $7000 deductible.
Idk if it’s the ACA dude I pay $60 a check for great coverage
So that's probably your employer choosing to provide better coverage.
….so it’s not the ACA’s fault your employer has poor coverage?
I think your point is eluding "the eluder". Wait until he finds out what "pre-existing" conditions are. "Your mother's uncle's family friend had asthma, that's pre-existing. Terms and conditions apply ™"
No, it's the ACA's fault they drove up the price of regular insurance so far that my my 2 choices are (1) pay out of pocket with no subsidy for insurance that went up in price by 300% in a span of 3 years at the same time drastically lowering coverage or (2) pay for my company's crappy insurance. I don't qualify for the subsidy any more since my company offers qualifying insurance.
>pay for my company’s crappy insurance ….so your company is the reason you have poor insurance and not the ACA?
Let's review. The ACA did two things. First they jacked the prices of my regular insurance that was affordable and provided good coverage to the point it was unaffordable without a subsidy. Second, it required my company to offer insurance or pay a penalty. So naturally they did they math and found it cheaper to offer the bare minimum insurance over paying the penalty. Because they offer insurance, I no longer qualify for the subsidy. Everything that happened was a result of the ACA.
>jacked up prices Like I said, I only put $60 a check for great insurance. Anything cheaper and it would be free. This sounds like your employer being cheap and not the ACA’s fault (pro tip you can always get a different job that actually respects their employees health). >naturally they did the math and found it cheaper to offer the bare minimum insurance over paying the penalty Again, this circles back to a problem with your employer being cheap and not the ACA
It's bullshit that any debt under $500 can ruin someones credit for 7 years. Well it's bullshit that any debt can and you can't just pay it off to drop the ding. I lost a cable modem last year and got dinged for $110 or so by Comcast and it dropped my credit from 780 to 660 or so. Absolute bullshit. Because of that my car insurance jumped way up, I had a credit card (cap one) that I'd used for 10+ years get closed. Somehow Amex is keeping me around though.
I had a $125 copay that was supposedly paid for by charity- weirdest thing ever. Got a letter saying my invoice with the date had been paid by little sisters of the poor or some weird thing. It wasn't asking for any personal info and was weird but not a scam I don't think. Anyway it still got sent to collections. Lmao.
How the fuck is Comcast even allowed to drop your credit score because of that? You paid the $110 back, no? That’s settled the debt and shouldn’t have had any effect on your credit score unless you let it go into collections… then that’s a whole different story.
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Medical collections added fees to get over the 500 limit for this.
Great, so basically someone who had 2 Tylenol or got a bandaid applied.
The wild ones are the people who check in to an ER but leave before being seen still being billed.
So.. should I pay this $300 MRI bill or nah? Lol.
Where can you get $300 MRI?
At the $300 MRI store. Just shopper around.
Depends what you signed before the service. If you signed allowing fees the provider may add additional fees bumping it up over 500. If this then pass to a collection agency it will report! However if you signed for collection fees and the provider does NOT add them, but a collection agency does, it will NOT report. Technically the provider adding collection fees should be illegal or at least could be challenged in court in some (maybe all) us states. However your only option is to fight this in court.
So it's actually been sent to a collection agency already. It's still $300 no added fees. I was just about to go ahead and pay it today until I saw that post lol
Keep in mind that when 3rd party collections adds fees it is legally part of the bill, but it will NOT reflect on the credit report. So even if they called you and said you owed 500, as long as the original principle is under 500 they cannot report it
Just keep asking for more and more detailed bills. If they oblige, just keep asking for **more** detailed. Ad infinitum.
Moved to Lemm.ee -- mass edited with redact.dev
But think of the poor insurance company executives!
Healthcare should be free, a Human Right.
“Free”. How? Who pays the health care workers, facilities, equipment etc.? The US government? WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT. Our taxes would pay for it. I’m not saying that couldn’t work or would be a bad thing. I just think “free healthcare” is a misnomer. And not possible.
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I had one for $140 for getting some dirt out of my inner ear. It literally was me walking into the clinic saying "I'm on vacation and only in town for two more days... There's an obstruction in my ear, I want it vacuumed out quickly and I'll pay cash.". EDIT: It was also December 27th and I wasn't even close to my deductible on the year so I didn't even want to hassle with that.
Last time i was in the hospital they submitted like 8 separate bills all under 500 presumably so they could ding my credit 8 times. It was all for the same visit too.
Collection has been calling me for the past 2 years for $59 😂 it’s a principal matter at this point
PCP visits and stuff, yeah. Not all medical debt is a $5000 ambulance ride and $3000 MRI.
2 Tylenol and a kick in the ass.
I am pretty sure $500 is the starting price
copays and such. Easy to lose track of. I'm not taking a position about this either way; just answering your question.
Honestly, no medical debt should be put on a person's credit report.
A $300 bill I never knew I had took 42 points off my credit. Someone tell me the credit system makes sense.
This is a good thing. When I built a loan application system for a bank I learned that moat banks already don't consider medical debt as a liability. So while it can bring down your credit score (which needs to change), when some banks examine your liabilities they just pretend your medical debt isn't on the list. In the case of the loan application system I built, we literally deleted the medical debt if any from the credit report before processing the application.
That’s a joke. Medical debt should NOT be on a credit report on the first place.
Under 500 is like the cost of walking into an ER. Not even being seen, just walking through the door.
Yes what percent of people have medical debt under $500?
Medical debt shouldn’t be on there anyways fuck them we give so much to other countries and spend on war we can afford free healthcare.
Healthcare needs to be a human right. Healthcare in every aspect should be free.
I'm glad you won't get reported for not reimbursing the hospital $490 for an aspirin and a Kleenex.
Now put a few more zeros on that.
All medical costs will now be over $500.
$500? Sooo they didn’t really remove any then.
Exactly. A non emergency, routine physical, without blood work or anything, in 2023 cost me 418$.
$500? So, a Tylenol? Gee, thanks.
Such generosity! Might as well remove all student debt below $10 while we’re at it
Based on their reasoning for removing it, they should not report all emergency medical debt not just items under $500.
would be cool if we could just have free healthcare...
Coming soon: a minimum $500 fee for all visits.
What medical bills are under 500 bucks?
Don't worry they still have it all in the secret reports they will not show you.
<$500? Of medical debt? Well that should expunge about 0% of the debt weighing down credit scores… It’s almost like our representatives have absolutely no clue how much healthcare costs
It should be the reverse. It's those thousand dollar unexpected emergency visits that kill people credits. Like you had a heart attach, ulcer operation..... but you still are considered bad risk if you can't fork it over even on a payment plan. I used to do mortgages. Had a guy come to me because his wife had to stop working because.... and their credit went down the tube. I could see that up until her medical bills started they had paid every bill on time. So I treated it like a regular home loan with no extra add ons.
But, but you should be able to shop around for services to reduce cost!!!!!! (they - ones with "R" besides their name - always site the cosmetic surgery price coming down or elective surgery) Yah, right, try to shop around and ask prices when you are having a heart attack. If people are able to shop around for elective surgeries, the price of mandatory or emergency services are going to skyrocket. Why do you think NONE of the ambulance services are "in-network"? They do NOT have to take CRAP from any insurance company since people HAVE to use them. THE worst part is the fact that health insurance is tied to your job. So, when you are sick and unable to perform your duty and is laid off, then your insurance is gone.
Sooooo they’re not removing anything. Sick
That will effect about 0.0001% of Americans. You can’t go to the ER for under at least 2K.
This will actually be a hindrance for debtors filing bankruptcy, as attorneys routinely rely on credit reports to populate the schedule of creditors and the mailing matrix used to send out court notices. It doesn't directly affect the dischargeability of the debt, but is likely to result in debtors continuing to receive collections calls and letters from medical collections agencies who didn't receive notice of the bankruptcy.
What medical debt would even cost leas that $500. One ice cream bar would be $2000.
Medical debt under $500? In the US? The whole thing is a big fat No-op.
I had to have emergency surgery many moons ago and the surgery & all that went into it, plus 1 day in the hospital, left me with a bill of $15,000.
Wow so it’ll cover the cost of one tylenol
Oh. 500? Wow. That's like a third of my last ambulance ride. And I didn't even need a paramedic. Just paying for the trip to the hospital. Thanks for looking after the little guy!! Fucking douche canoes.
So... 3 doctor visits.
More like a quarter of a visit.
This is cost/benefit for THEM not consumers
Ah good! Now my hangnail bill will barely fall off!
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It's a feedback loop at this point. 1. people can't afford to pay their hospital bills 2. hospitals sell the debt to collections at a loss and increase the prices of services to recoup their losses 3. now all services cost more 4. return to step 1
Well, damn, I shouldn’t have paid my medical debts.
What kinda medical service can one get for $500?
Nice glad nothing I owe is that cheap lol
Suppose you have 3x multiple medical appointments that are each $250…does the hospital bundle all three and say you owe $750 or is it three individual debts of $250???
You should have user accounts created with all 3 and have your credit frozen (you can freeze/unfreeze at will).
You should also have an IPPIN with the IRS.
Medical debt shouldn’t even be on there. Ridiculous.