Just received a email from my doctor with a 288 dollar bill. Which confused me because I have health insurance. So call my healthcare provider because I should only have a co pay. I mean I pay 80 dollars out of every check for this plan.
Then the lady on the phone with zero empathy tells me that they only pay after I meet the deductible. Which is $7000!!! Like what the fuck. This is why the whole healthcare system needs to be burn to the ground and start over with universal healthcare. To make matters worse, spoke to my employer and they say I can’t cancel or make changes because its not an open window. WHY THE FUCK DO WE HAVE ONLY SET TIMES WE CAN MAKE CHANGES TO OUR HEALTHCARE PLANS that we pay for?
No wonder one of these parasites was a shot in the back. They are all monsters and anyone who works for them are no better. So fucking pissed right now! Seeing fucking red. Now got figure out how to come up with 288 dollars to pay the doctor bill!
Our healthcare in this country does suck, and should be criminal. But, it’s the system that we have and until it changes it is the system we have to deal with.
I am assuming that this must be the first time you’ve used your insurance, so you are either young, in relative good health, or both. During Open Enrollment you were likely given a few options of insurance plans to choose from and it sounds like you went with the cheapest option without fully understanding what that entailed. The High Deductible Healthcare Plans (HDHP) are generally lower cost per pay period than a traditional plan because of the high deductible part. A HDHP is actually a good option if you are in relative good health and often don’t go to the doctor for a few reasons, the first being the cost of the premiums is much lower even if you do go to the doctor once or twice a year. Another reason the HDHP is a good option is that it gets you access to a Health Savings Account (HSA) which lets you put pre-tax money into the account each pay period. There are limits, and this year it’s $4400 for individual and $8750 for families. If your deductible is $7k, I’m guessing you’re part of a family plan… so you can either plan each year to put in the max out of pocket for your plan into your HSA, or you can max out your contribution. Maxing out your contribution, if you can do it, is the way to go because the HSA account is also another avenue for retirement savings. And, when you get a certain amount of money in your HSA you can start investing that money… I put anything above my deductible into the S&P and I’ve seen amazing growth over the past 20 years.
So a few things for you to look into:
Sorry this happened to you… I do hope you’re young and that this is just a learning experience. Our insurance setup in this country sucks, is difficult to understand, and no one really does a good job of explaining it, you just have to learn by trial and error, sadly.
No I am 46 last time I had this same healthcare with a different employer my co pay was 25 for doctors visit. The fucking deductible shit only came into effect for hospital visits or if had to have something done. But just to visit my doctor for a checkup? No apparently this is all my company wants to supply. Fucking fitting that I work for an insurance company.
Employers are able to sign up for different types of plans. Your previous employer paid more so that their employees had better coverage.
I’m sorry you’re dealing with this. It’s a terrible system.
As others have mentioned, you should have had the option when signing up for your current insurance provider to set up an HSA, HRA, or FSA. All three are types of debit accounts that you get to put money into for healthcare expenses pre-tax (so it’s money you earn but don’t have to pay income tax on).
If you chose not to elect for an HSA/HRA/FSA, this was your first mistake.
If you’d like to know more about them, how they work, and the difference between them, I’m happy to explain.
Additionally, you may have been offered a choice between several different insurance plans. It’s important to understand the differences between them, and select the best fit for your healthcare needs. The type of plan you select will drastically change not just your premiums and copays, but also your deductible, when that deductible applies, which of the above healthcare money accounts you can have, and more.
Our system is truly fucked. But at this moment, it is the system we live in, and arming yourself with the knowledge to navigate it effectively is your best defense. They certainly aren’t going to look out for you or help you if you find out you made a bad choice for your needs.
The math on optimizing these things can be daunting. If you are willing to describe your plan to me in detail I can offer advice on how to move forward.
Good luck ❤️🩹
Puts on Luigi hat
Nah, yeah, this is a more effective solution.
Strike at the root of the disease, not just managing symptoms.
I know this is a crazy concept, but stick with me here…
… what if, and I’m just throwing this out there, not everyone is in a position where they can murder a CEO and there are actually millions of people impacted who each need to consider their own circumstances, allowing us to tackle the problem from multiple directions simultaneously over time?
I know, that’s probably insane, and everyone fits in a neat little box that lets you tell random people on the Internet that they shouldn’t bother learning to navigate a hostile system and instead “strike at the root of the disease” while invoking the image of a vigilante hero without offering any practical advice, but I figure maybe it’s worth considering.
Your advice leads to the problem only getting worse.
Its not sustainable, at scale, over time.
It infact causes further reliance on the system.
It ensures more suffering for more people, in the long run.
You could also maybe just figure out a way to practice of obtain medical treatment that is outside of the system.
That would require courage, less courage than trying to strike at the root cause, but probably more courage than most people have.
The system is broken.
There are various ways of attempting to respond to that, but uh, continuing to engage with the system that is actively, aggressively, nakedly exploiting you?
I mean, if you’ve got a humiliation fetish, sounds good!
Otherwise… nah this a literally evil joke at this point.
Normalcy bias, turns out, can be fatal, just as well the opposite can be.
So you don’t carry any insurance, right? No auto insurance? No health insurance? No dental? No vision? No life? Proudly refusing antibiotics when you get an infection? Anti-vax? Set your own broken bones? No hospitals for you, right? Or do you just take on the massive debt without insurance, never paying it off, and relying on other people to fund your free healthcare?
I can’t tell if you’re a naive idealist who is going to get fucked over big time some day soon, a hypocrite who preaches rebellion while utilizing the very “evil” they claim to be fighting, or simply an idiot who hasn’t thought it through.
Like, I’m not even trying to be an asshole here, but your position is so ridiculously impractical for the majority of people just trying to subsist in a fucked up society, that there aren’t any other options.
I also notice that you’re posting gleefully on the internet instead of sitting in a jail cell for killing a CEO, Mr. “Luigi hat”. What’s your excuse?
Also lmao at “obtain medical treatment outside the system”. Those are called back-alley doctors and are insanely risky. Unless you mean something like prayer healing and measles parties which is just laughably ignorant.
No, you’re just making some shit up, and acting incredulous at other things.
You are indeed trying to be an asshole.
I’ve turned down ambulance rides, got an uber instead, or fucking walked.
I’ve walked out of hospitals after ambulance rides, without giving them any id.
Back when Covid was going on, and I actually could have benefitted from having broken bones set… I just sat in a waiting toom for 10 hours.
Needed to eat something that day, got up left.
And yeah, I did set my own broken bone.
(I eventually managed to get my shit together enough to get a whole body’s worth of xray’s done - doc told i did a pretty good job of setting it
I’ve been homeless for years and know enough first aid, basic trauma response to keep myself and other people I ran into alive.
My ‘excuse’ for why I’m not currently doing anything is that I’m fucking crippled, can’t afford the ongoing therapy, so I went to a few appointments, got them to print out the excercises, and just do it at home.
What’s your excuse?
I don’t have a car, and getting to the appointments is too painful, regresses my recovery, because no nearby medical center of any kind has a transit option, and the local charity that tries to is stretched rather thin.
You’re acting like I’m an anti vax raw milk drinking measles party promoter.
You’re exactly as arrogant as I figured you’d be, as, you know, a status quo apologist.
I hope what happened to me happens to you so you get a bit of reality check. No ids, no money no phone, 2 years. Good luck.
Oh I see. So YOUR life circumstances are relevant to what you choose to do and not do, and why you are in the situations you’re in, but nobody else’s could possibly be?
Not like other people have families to take care of.
You can pretend all you want that you’re taking a stand, but you all but admitted that you were prepared to use the resources of the system in place, you just didn’t like how it went when you tried. Or didn’t have the means to get yourself there.
I’m sure everyone looks quite small from way up on that horse.
You are exactly the self-righteous, judgemental hypocrite I thought you were.
Whatever helps you sleep at night, I guess.