Medical Bill Discount

[sandyut]

You may know this, but figured I would say to help anyone who doesn’t.

If you call the hospital billing dept and ask for a discount for paying the bill in full, they may give you one.

• On my old health ins. I could get 10% every bill with this.
• On my new ins. (different hospital group) I got 5%.

Neither is huge for minor stuff, but as some of you know I broke my ankle and needed surgery, PT etc. I am on ACÁ insurance that has a high deductible and Max OOP. So 5% was still a fair amount.

Work it if you can.

 

[R Blum]

I tried this once. I went to the Hospital billing and told them I would pay in full if they reduced the bill. No go. They said they couldn't do it.

 

[DougE]

I've had my part of hospital/surgery bills completely written off by the hospital. Hospitals will generally look at your situation, and go from there. Doctor's/surgeon's billing departments are not usually as willing to look at your situation. I once had a surgeon's office staff refuse to let me see the doc for follow up until I paid an $895 dollar co-pay. On the doctor's orders, I could not return to work, so I don't know where they expected me to get the money.

 

[sandyut]

I've had my part of hospital/surgery bills completely written off by the hospital.

I had a surgeon assisted x-ray that they couldn’t seem to bill correctly and they eventually wrote it off.

I think its always worth asking. Especially with high deductible ins. My deductible is like $6700 and max out of pocket $8500. Both pretty standard for healthcare.gov ins. Any discount is not applied to those numbers. I will keep asking.