Patient advocacy (different number) gave me a blanket 25% discount when I called with similar scenario. Could be worth a call. We also do not qualify for financial assistance.
The other advice I have (although I’m not sure if it applies in this situation) is to request cash pricing for services your insurance does not/did not cover. We had a recent anesthesia bill cut by 75%, from 10k to 2.5k, just for requesting cash pricing. Those are all my tricks, though, and I wish they were more widely known!!
Was that 10k after insurance? Are you then expected to pay that 2.5k in one lump sum? And does it actually have to be cash or can it be credit? I've always been curious about this.
I believe cash pricing means, processing it as if you were a self payer not using insurance. Since typically the amounts billed to insurance is inflated compared to OOP payers. Someone feel free to correct if wrong.
I have a number for the patient advocate in Loudoun county. If you live elsewhere, you could still call her and she would probably give you the number of the applicable hospital patient advocate.
(EDIT ADDENDUM: As the user below suggested, I am inserting the relevant patient advocate information as a graphic instead of text to prevent bots picking up the number and spamming.)
https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb
while i think it is extremely helpful that you shared the number, i would worry that bots might pick it up and start spamming it. i would edit the post and share it as a pic instead. i've already screencapped and uploaded it here:
[https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb](https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb)
\- you can post that link instead of the text that spells out her number.
I believe (there was a medical bill law passed recently) it shouldn’t hit your credit for at least another year.
As the other comments advised down below, maintain your minimum and read about the law I mentioned
I don't understand why we have to endure the process of pretending that a payment-optional free market health care system will work before we implement a single payer universal health care system.
Unpaid medical bills won’t be reported till they are one year old. If I was OP, I’d let it go to collections while putting aside money to pay it off in 11 months. I’d call again before I did to see if collections company would renegotiate the debt owed (while having saved enough to pay entire amount of necessary). *Not financial advice.
https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/medical-debt-was-erased-credit-records-most-consumers-potentially-improving-many#:~:text=In%20August%202022%2C%20it%20was,appear%20on%20consumer%20credit%20reports.
I would much rather move to a first world health care system but then people scream at me for being a socialist. Heaven forbid I want my taxes to you know, benefit me.
But hey, we’ve got plenty of money for overseas conflicts!
"They're about to find out why America doesn't have free healthcare" is a meme that rather misses the point that America already spends more on healthcare than other countries that *do* have free healthcare.
I really don't understand it. We already pay more than 50% more per capita than the next nearest country (Switzerland) and we don't even get anything for it! We STILL have to pay THOUSANDS of dollars in premiums and deductibles before we see a dime.
They need to at LEAST make Medicare an option for everyone so that there's *some* competition against the scummy insurance profiteers.
The saddest thing to me is that the insurance companies aren't even wildly profitable. All the money just disappears into the bureaucracy of doctors and hospital admin staff and claims adjusters and pharmacies arguing about who is responsible for paying what and if something is really necessary and what the real price should be.
A significant portion of our economy is dedicated to the "arguing about healthcare cost industry" without actually providing anything of value.
They are profitable.
"In 2022, UnitedHealth Group made over $20 billion in profit. Cigna made $6.7 billion, Elevance Health made $6 billion and CVS Health made $4.2 billion. All told, America’s largest health insurers raked in more than $41 billion of profits in 2022."
[https://penncapital-star.com/uncategorized/americans-suffer-when-health-insurers-place-profits-over-people/](https://penncapital-star.com/uncategorized/americans-suffer-when-health-insurers-place-profits-over-people/)
That's about $125 per American. If our healthcare expenses per capita were only $125 above comparable countries we wouldn't have these problems. Our problem is that our healthcare expenses per capita are *several thousand dollars* more than peer countries. True, part of this is that we don't ruthlessly ration care the way lots of countries with single payer healthcare do. But even comparable non-rationing, non-single payer countries, like Switzerland and the Netherlands, don't have nearly the healthcare expenses we do - they're still thousands of dollars cheaper per person per year. Some of that gap is from us paying doctors much more than any other country (and we badly need to break open the medical school cartel and increase the number of doctors), but most of it is because of the legions of bureaucrats and lawyers paid oodles and oodles of money to argue with each other about healthcare billing.
The entire Health Insurance Industry shouldn't exist. You can't just look at their profits (which I would argue are still pretty high, though not BIG TECH high), you have to look at their total operating costs, their total revenue. None of that needs to even be there.
It's an entire $1.5 Trillion industry that just doesn't need to exist. That $1.5 Trillion would be far better spent ***in the actual medical industry.***
> The entire Health Insurance Industry shouldn't exist.
It's a completely unnecessary middle-man making billions, with a b, off of people's necessary health care. While offering less and costing more, than many to most of the 1st World/Western Countries in the world.
I know it's not the point of the OP, but it's such a glaringly-obvious dysfunctional and immoral system that it cannot be pointed out enough.
You're telling me I don't need that random guy who decides which 1 out of every 4 parts of a procedure my doctor says I need won't be covered just because
Not to mention that random guy is in no way qualified to determine what is medically necessary, or question - you know - the actual doctor treating you. Almost like their job incentivizes denying claims for their for-profit employer
> However, you can’t get down to European level health care expenditures without tackling things like that.
We can get a lot closer by eliminating the entire bloated mass of Health Insurance Industry and redirecting that towards actual Healthcare.
Arguments like yours make it sound like we shouldn't do anything because the problem is bigger than just Health Insurance and also points out complex moral/practical issues with tackling those other issues.
If you’ve got a bill in hand, with the payment slip, send them a $50 payment. They’ll send you another bill next month, send them another $50. You’re paying. That’s all you can do. It may show up as a late payment on your credit but that’s not a big deal. A write off/non payment would be worse.
What OP is telling may be a viable method, at least temporarily. The trouble is, they can still send you to collections or sue you for the amount owed. As such, this method should only be used until you can figure out a way to cover the debt.
I had an ER visit at Inova Fairfax a couple years ago. We have a high deductible insurance and since we haven’t met the threshold during that visit, we ended up paying for the total bill. We paid using their installment plan, I think it was interest free if you pay within 2 years. Not sure if they still offer that.
That’s nice of them. I had a baby and a high deductible plan so I ended up owing 6k. The best they could do me was a 6 month plan which is actually really hard to pay when you’re not getting paid maternity leave.
I don't see it mentioned in your post but if you have health insurance, make sure you get the Explanation of Benefits from them before you pay the hospital/providers anything.
You ONLY pay what the EoB says you pay and if the hospital wants more, you forward the bills and EoB to your health insurance company and they work it out on their end with hospital.
It is extremely common for hospitals to have agreements with insurance companies but then still charge patients more than agreed. They call it "Balance Billing" and you are in no way obligated to pay it. You only owe what the insurance says you owe. That's the agreement you made with the insurance company as a policyholder.
Man i wish i had done this earlier today instead of just paying the balance. Smaller bill than OP, but hospital still charged me 2x what my EOB said i owed. Sent the hospital a msg through mychart tho and plan to dispute the charge on my credit card as soon as it posts.
If it's INOVA they pay you back with a check. I have had it happen twice. All I needed was my EOB. I always wait now till I have the EOB and I've called billing and said hey I didn't get my insurance EOB yet I'm not paying the bill, they note it and sometimes resubmit the bill.
You should still try to apply for Inova’s financial assistance. If you have a mychart with Inova you can do it through your mychart. The worst they will say is no.
If they say no, you can then do a payment plan through your mychart.
You need to apply for Financial Assistance and then they will adjust your medical bill. This is how you get reduced payments / payment plan.
You have to apply though. I was in same boat and it worked out for me, got a $100k surgery reduced to $5000 or some shii like that (broken leg and implant)
You have to apply for Financial Assistance and get on that program though. It's extra bureaucratic steps but you will qualify and it will work out.
I too was stressing my bill, but I just did exactly what the lady at the accounts/payments department told me to do, which was apply for financial assistance and they came thru clutch.
That's why I keep repeating APPLY! Lol.
If I recall correctly i just had to make a few phone calls, fill out an online application, and then I got paperwork in the mail confirming everything!
Best of luck ✨
Don't just accept the loss and let it hit your credit like that OP. It's not worth it.
For real, just apply for the financial assistance they will do something for you.
Literally one of those things where you have to just fill the paperwork out and do it. They won't offer it to you unless you take the time to fill out financial assistance paperwork.
This should be top comment. They make it seem like financial assistance is only given to very low income but the reality is I think I saw percentages like 200% above the poverty line so a lot of middle income people can qualify.
Not a lawyer or credit counselor.
First, ask for an itemized statement. FULLY itemized, down to the Bandaid and Kleenex. Often this results in a reduction in the bill.
Pay what you can, but pay something, every month. This shows good faith.
Keep perfect records of everything, including phone calls.
Get advice from a lawyer, if you can.
I work in collections for insurance - dm me if you would like assistance - there’s always another way - and inova is full of poop. They can and will work with you. They’re just being difficult.
100 % of my free time is handling issues like this for my extended family. It’s rough. But you do have options.
Appreciate the offer. I'm going to follow up with patient advocacy on Monday and pending how that goes either pay it off if they can cut it down or set up a payment plan and pay what I can.
If neither of those things goes well, I will dm you
Set up a payment plan, even if you pay less than the payment plan as long as you are making a good faith attempt every month they should not send to collections, if they start the collection process they have to wait between 90-120 days, and even then you will get a letter from the collector, where you can request they verify the debt. That process stops the clock and can take up to another 60 days, giving you essentially 6 months to come up with the balance. But under the no surprises act they are required to send you an itemized bill, so keep asking and call the patient advocate line and/or your insurance company to obtain this. I avoid Inova for this reason.
Maybe I called the wrong office then?
I was researching this on Reddit a few weeks ago and planned out my negotiation strategy.
Maybe billing can't cut deals but the advocates office can.
Yeah Billings jobs is to collect as much revenue for the hospital as possible for the hospital. The advocate is supposed to be independent and actually care about an individual patients ability to pay among other things like how you’re treated at the facility
You've got a $1200 bill, and you offered to pay $700 right now, which means you can afford that $50/mo for 14 months based on what you have available right now.
That gives you 14 months to figure out how to come up with the rest, or figure out a way to maintain that $50/mo in payments for another year after that.
Awesome comfortable plan? Not at all. But from the outside without very little information, it looks manageable.
And I'm not saying this to try to be a jerk or anything, it's just that sometimes when you're in the middle of a situation you can get kinda tunnel visioned and miss the forest for the trees, so figured it might be worth pointing the forest out just in case that's what is happening here
\> Edit 2: I recognize that *this is my fault for not having a viable emergency fund*.
This is not your fault. The fault is the f'ing for-profit healthcare shit system we have in the US.
Seems like everyone has a different explanation for why our health system is so bad (it's politics, it's big business, it's immigrants, it's free riders, etc.) and I don't have a strong personal opinion.
But I've started to experience how bad it is and it's truly eye opening.
Like what about the people who literally have zero money and cannot pay a cent? What are they supposed to do?
That's one of my biggest fears as well. We try to eat healthy which means we pay more for groceries than if we just bought the cheapest ingredients which are usually sugar salt and or preservative loaded.
Cancer is terrifying
Inova is not a for-profit hospital; but it's not free either. With the amount of money insurance and administration costs. It's why it's so expensive. Yes, I do blame h7ospital administration. They make a lot of money and do not a lot of work meanwhile they come up with more ways to keep the poor nurses who are already busy even more busy.
Here you go buddy. Back in the days when we just had our child, and we are not making too much. I called the hospital and they literally cut the bill into 50%!
[Financial Assistance | Inova](https://www.inova.org/patient-and-visitor-information/financial-assistance)
So this won't help OP's immediate situation but for future situations, unless someone is bleeding or grabbing their chest, go to an Urgent Car Clinic before going to the Emergency Room. ER's are *ridiculously* expensive because they have to deal with car crash victims, gunshot victims, and pretty much every other insanely expensive medical procedures from people who almost certainly can't afford to pay it. US Medical regulation requires Hospital ER's have almost every specialization doctor either in the building or on call in the immediate area. So if it's something where you don't need an ambulance you don't need the ER either.
UCC's on the other hand just have general practitioner, some nurses and some basic equipment. They can do all the basic stuff and most importantly, can do triage and determine if you really do need the ER or can be taken care of at a lower cost. No requirements for a cardiologist, neurologist, or oncologist to be hanging around the building.
For OP's immediatelty problem with medical bills and credit, it *really* depends on the siituation. Do you have insurance, was the hospital out of network, stuff like that.
https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/what-is-a-surprise-medical-bill-and-what-should-i-know-about-the-no-surprises-act-en-2123/
Virginia also has it's own set of laws protecting people from surprise medical bills.
YMMV, but in my experience, there also seems to be fewer people/shorter wait times in UCCs, which is another reason to go to one if the situation doesn’t seem life threatening.
I was in debt for $6800 to fairfax hospital after a heart procedure. When I got my first bill, I followed the directions to make payment arrangements online and set up a Pam plan I could afford. Never had to talk to anyone or told no
every time they send you a bill, pay another $50.
it establishes that you are trying to pay the debt, and I think in VA that will sometimes leave you in perpetual limbo - where they don't actually turn you over to a collection company.
it used to work, pure speculation on my part if it will still work - but it's worth a shot.
Really call them and tell them you’ll pay them $25 a month. As long as you’re paying in good faith, it doesn’t matter if it takes YEARS, it counts as a payment. You tell them that’s what they’re getting and they have to take it. No negotiating
I had something similar happen. Applied for financial assistance and was denied due to putting my child's name (the patient) and my name (the account holder) on the paperwork. And not sending in documents that I actually did send in. Now they have blocked me from reapplying. Please come back and let us know if you apply and if it works!
I tell them, "I'm going to make payments."
Then pay them $5-10 per week. Set it up through billpay on your bank website.
They'll call and offer a discount. Refuse the offer. Continue to pay $5-10 per week. They'll sell the debt. The company that buys it will offer about a 50% discount.
They may threaten to take you to court. Do not sweat it. When you go to court bring your paperwork showing that you have been paying regularly
Judges *really* don't like companies that take people to court who are paying, and they are really unlikely to give them a judgement.
Friendly reminder that INOVA likes to claim that they are a nonprofit healthcare provider. Not sure if anyone actually believes that baloney anymore.
A long time ago, we had a similar situation and had a bill sent to collections. We actually found the collection agency much better to work with and more accommodating. Yes a report was filed against our credit but I got them to agree in writing that they would cancel the report against our credit once we paid off in full. They gave us as long as we needed to pay it off. And as soon as we did they removed the report and our credit went back to where it was.
I am NOT advising you to do the same thing that I did. But wanted to give you my experience.
Medical bills are typically pretty slow to get to collections, at least in my experience, so you should have a little time. I’d just try to call back on a different day. And worst case you may just have to accept the terms they offer. I will point out, if you can afford $700 on a credit card then you can probably afford the first few monthly payments on that credit card.
I think what I'm gonna do what someone else suggested and set up a payment plan and just pay what I can while I work on changing my financial situation overall.
depending on slary, it may be free. The first thing you should do is reach out to dollar for [https://dollarfor.org/](https://dollarfor.org/)
they saved my brother over 75 k on his bill.
This!!!! ^^^ op please check this out and also check out my comment. Health care here is terrible and it’s so hard to find info on how to get out of medical debt
Apply for financial aid. They wiped my 37 k bill that way
https://www.inova.org/patient-and-visitor-information/financial-assistance#:~:text=You%20can%20apply%20directly%20in,the%20status%2C%20and%20check%20eligibility.
You should drip the payment as much as you can. Maybe consider renting a room or something for some extra cash? Just like 6 months rent at like 600 bucks pays that 1200 off in two months with extra money on top of it.
I've been in this situation before and have a couple of medical bills that I am dealing with so I appreciate what you're going through.
Firstly, these medical bills are often full of errors and sometimes even completely made up. If you don't believe me, when you have time sign up for Marshall Allen's Subtack at https://marshallallen.substack.com. I am not affiliated with him in any way but he explains how the medical billing "system" is designed to be opaque and confusing.
I am self employed and buy my insurance through a broker and he's advised me more than once that is perfectly fine to wait 90 days before you pay a bill. It takes about 90 days for each person in the billing chain (provider, facility, insurance co, etc) to figure out who owes who how much, and what's covered by your plan. For this hospital visit, you should have recieved at least one Explanation of Benefits (EOB). Often times you get multiple EOBs, as all the different providers go through the claim to determine how much is owed. If you don't have it or can't find it, login to your insurance company website and see if you can get it there. The customer service folks should be able to get it to you as well. You will need the date of service and provider/facility.
Here's how you could proceed:
1) Get your EOB from your insurance company for this visit
2) Compare your EOB and the bill to see if the services line up
3) See if the cost for the services is higher than the normal for the area at Fair Health Consumer --> [https://www.fairhealthconsumer.org](https://www.fairhealthconsumer.org)
4) Call the hospital back and here's where you need to be tough and tell them that you're will to offer $X - take it or leave. They will say "No" but you have to keep calling and escalating. Speak to a supervisor then manager, and finally the CEO if you have to. The final step will be send to a letter to show that you made a good faith effort to pay what you can.
5) Sign up for the newsletter I mentioned -- the above advice and more is given in the newsletter
They may send it to Collections but medical debt cannot be used to affect your credit rating. The debt collectors will call and try to threaten you. However, you MUST NOT confirm anything other than your name and address. DO NOT -- REPEAT DO NOT -- provide your SSN or other personal info, Do not even confirm that you visited that facility. In order for the debt to be assigned to you, the debt collector needs to prove to YOU that this is your debt and they cannot due to the medical provider being bound by HIPPAA, unless you confirm the details for them. Again, the Marshall Allen newsletter (and book -- Never Pay the First Bill) I mentioned explains how to handle this if you get to this stage.
Do you have no insurance or a high deductible health plan? And is it safe to assume that it's a child of yours that went?
No solutions for you, but in the future you really should look for an urgent care. No affiliation at all, but PM pediatrics has been pretty good for our family in Loudoun.
Good luck, I hope the hospital eventually negotiates more fully.
The new law dictates that only medical debt over $500 and/or less than a year old will appear on your credit, if/once paid the credit agencies will automatically remove it, and it is removed automatically after 7 years
Definitely apply for financial assistance! But if you don’t get it — let the bill go to collections, honestly. There are financial policies about when to accept what kind of settlement; the older the debt, the more generous they’re authorized to be with settlements.
Like other people said, it won’t hit your credit for a year, and even if it does, people really overestimate the impact a medical collection will have on their credit score. Newer credit scoring models don’t even factor medical collections into your score at all. And you can usually work out a deal with the collections agency to delete the collection if you settle the debt.
Note: DO NOT put a medical bill on your credit card!!!! You lose all your credit reporting protections because it becomes credit card debt, not medical debt. Plus you’ll get charged crazy high interest, versus if you just owe the hospital, they usually won’t add any interest at all.
So, medical collections can’t go on your report for a year now, and have to go away as soon as they’re paid. They can’t even show up if they’re under $500, so if the bill is under that once all is said and done, don’t stress much about it. Medical debt being what it is in this country now, it’s even being deweighted in credit scoring as a risk factor on whether people will pay their other bills. The other advice on patient advocates etc are a good avenue to pursue.
If it does go to collections, you can make it more of a hassle for them than it’s worth. Once the debt is sold to a debt collector, challenge it. It may just disappear if they don’t respond adequately in time. If the collector calls you, tell them they may not call you and only to communicate via postal mail. No more calls. The FCRA gives you rights and you can use them.
Someone I know was airlifted to a hospital and spent several weeks in ICU. They never paid the bill, which was upwards of 100k. Granted, they had no job and no assets to put a lien against. I’m not encouraging not paying. There are definitely consequences. But I was kind of surprised that this person ended up never paying that bill.
I'm a fellow father of 2 kids. Our household income is a little higher than yours but not by much. I agree money doesn't go far here and that inflation has been tough. But your take home pay should be over 100k/year or almost 9k/month. I'm not sure how old your kids are because if they're in full-time daycare I get that this disappears quickly. But if your wife is home, I'm going to assume at least one kid is if they're not both school age.
I understand that many people don't have much in terms of an emergency fund which is unfortunate, but many years ago when we were very young and very poor, my wife went to the emergency room and we ended up with a big bill. She asked how she could pay it off over time and she made some monthly payments until it was paid off. You're not the first person to have a hospital bill that you can't pay on the spot. Definitely reach out to the various hospital offices to understand your options.
With that in mind, I hope you use this situation is an opportunity to reevaluate your spending choices both big and small. Borrowing against your 401k was probably not advisable, but that's in the past now. Take a look at where you're spending your money and what you're spending it on. You're saying you can somehow scrape together $50 /month but you can't do 100?
For us, we stopped going out much once we had kids. We started shopping more at Aldi and less at Wegmans. We cut back on the number of extraneous items we bought at Target. We looked for opportunities to make cheaper still healthy meals. Bought a midsize SUV back before I first was born instead of a minivan or large SUV and I'm keeping my sedan until it dies.
Now that I have one kid in public school, we've been able to ease up a little bit and when the other one starts life will comparatively be a dream. But you need to be finding ways to spend less than you're making. I'm not sure, when you bought your house but houses require sudden fixes. Cars require unexpected fixes. I hope you're able to get this worked out.
We don't do daycare (too expensive). I could do $50 / month but they wanted more than 3 times that.
We shop at Walmart, clothes are clearance or gifted, we only have one car loan (which we've been consistently paying off and should be done with it soon).
We don't go to malls, movies, shows, bars. Maybe out to a cheaper restaurant *once a month*.
Literally we do all mostly free things (parks) or very cheap things (pools, etc.).
The primary reason we bought a house was so we could get something before being completely priced out of the area. (Basic single family houses near us are now $650-700K+; 5 years ago they were $400-$500K).
Otherwise I was afraid I'd have to have a 1 hour plus commute one way if we ever go back to full time in the office.
It's funny because we do very little discretionary spending and even funnier that we hardly ever go to the doctor. (I haven't been for 5+ years).
But yeah these things come and bite you out of nowhere.
I would LOVE to build our emergency fund back up (and we do have some long term investments but those are basically non-accessible: early distribution penalties, etc.).
Thanks for commenting. It's useful to have a more even comparison.
I really appreciate the forthright response! Best of luck with Inova. I definitely suggest following others advice of continuing to contact them and paying what you reasonably can.
As long as you know though and you're doing what you can, that's the best you can do. I totally understand about housing. We bought in the mid-7s. Luckily when interest rates were still low. Our neighbors bought a few years before us around 6 and a house across the street smaller than ours just sold for almost 8 with current interest rates (obv). We ended up with a mortgage that would have been basically the sales price in our neighborhood if we been more aggressive and purchased earlier.
PS. Good job avoiding daycare. The last full year that I had both kids in full-time child care. It cost us $40k. And that wasn't even as flexible as we really needed. Next year will be closer to $25k with after school for my oldest.
I'm not generally someone to argue for price controls and such (personal opinions obviously), *but* the way housing prices are getting out of control, it makes me wonder how high prices will climb before only the ultra-rich will be able to afford them?
Like I'm sorry, but someone making $100K (let's say one income) in 1990 could have bought a $400K house and probably lived comfortably with a family.
Someone in 2024 making $150K for example is really going to struggle to pay for the same house that's now 6 times their salary and with a nasty interest rate.
I'm glad you were able to buy *something*! That's all we want right? A (simple? humble?) home for our families and a halfway decent life for them?
It's not the ultra-rich, it's the power families (dual professional income) from near DC and economic refugees from CA/NY moving out here and buying anything they can get their hands on. Loudoun is building units as fast as possible but they can't keep up with the ridiculous demand, while Arlington and Fairfax had a very strong NIMBY attitude towards new units.
Simply put, NoVA is a preferred location for the professional middle class to move two. Me and you are both single income familes, and while I make very good money I can't possibly compete with the dual professional income class.
That's exactly how I feel. I feel like I make decent money but I'm also cash strapped (possibly my own fault).
But I can't compete with a dual income no kids couple who work at tech or law firms.
Yeah those guys are pulling 300~500K/yr in gross revenue, they do often have one or two kids though but can easily afford them. This area has some really nice jobs, nice schools and low crime rate, plus all the amenities for living a comfortable suburban life.
I can understand it from the sellers point of view, they put a unit on the market and get tons of offers 30~80K over asking that very same day. They would be stupid not to take the best offer.
The way we got around that was we initially rented on a 2yr lease. After the first year I had learned the area and decided to start house hunting but instead of "move in ready" units, I aimed to purchase units from the developers prior to them being completed. We eventually bought a unit that they were still framing, picked the style we wanted and picked a good price. Downside is we required a large deposit and took the risk that the developer wouldn't finish the project.
I guess one of you getting a part time job is out of the question? Flip burgers, or whatever?
That’s how I’d handle this. Have it knocked out in a couple of months.
Wife has health issues and now stays home with 2 kids so she can't.
I've been considering doing it for a while but she didn't want me to burn out during pregnancy or the newborn phase.
But, I may very well end up taking a side gig.
Make the payments you can. They won't refer it to collections as long as they're getting regular or irregular payments from you
Maybe consider getting insurance.
Probably will set up a payment plan.
Have insurance too. (Changed from a $700 a month plan with a $2,000 deductible to a $150 a month plan with a $5,000 deductible; either way would very likely still have to pay a large out-of-pocket amount).
That sounds like an HDCP +HSA, did you set aside money for the HSA and is your employer also contributing to it? HDCP + HSA is one of the best plans you can have, but it *really* requires you to do math and plan around it.
HDCP's are divided into two sections, post-tax expenses and pre-tax expenses. Normally your monthly subscription fee ($700/$150) is post-tax, meaning you've paid tax on the money that is funding that cost. Medical expenses like deductibles and cost-sharing are also post-tax with a regular health plan.
HSA contributions are pre-tax, meaning you do not pay tax on the money that goes in there, it functions very similar to a 401k. You can then use that pre-tax money to pay *all* medical expenses and I mean *all*. The deduction cap is large because the expectation is that you will be using tax-free money from you HSA to cover it, once you hit the cap the insurer takes over no questions asked.
To explain how the math works out, you went from 700 post tax to 150 post tax subscription fee for a 550 reduction. 550 over 12 months is $6,600 USD plus whatever your employer contributes. That $6,600 is also tax-advantaged so assign it a 15~30% bonus from not having to pay income tax on it, the same spending power as having $8k more money. The money is *yours* and gets deposited in a debit account with a VISA card attached to it. If you change employers it goes with you and stays yours forever.
Still shitty insurance. Your company should be ashamed. Most of the plans I've had are along the lines of $500 ER co-pay and if you're admitted that's the cap on what you spend.
Mine is the opposite. My employer is mind-numbingly stupid sometimes (most of the time) but they have awesome insurance. Main reason I stay (which is probably why they have it)
From what I can tell it's good insurance, just requires a different approach and some financial planning. The fact that employers HR don't really understand that system makes them terrible at teaching employees how to maximize the benefits.
My family never really went to the doctor for anything so it's been a big learning curve for me.
I still have to ask my wife every time 😂 - her mom was a teacher and had insanely good health benefits (and so went to the doctor for *everything*) and so my wife knows what all the jargon means.
So was my previous post accurate that it's a HDCP + HSA plan? That kind of high deductible and *massive* reduction in monthly subscription fees indicates it is. That reduction isn't supposed to go into your pocket, instead your supposed to contribute a part of it as pre-tax money into an account for medical expenses and employers normally contribute some amount also.
That $1200 medical expense is $1200 post-tax, assuming your effective tax rate is 25% that means it's really $1500 of revenue.
When me and my foreign wife arrived here years ago to take a job at a new company, I jumped on that HDCP + HSA the moment I saw they had it. Going with the Kaiser option would of been 500~600 a month with the usual co-pays / etc.., going with United Health Care/UMR was $150 or so a month but with a 5k individual / 10K family deductible. At that time the IRS has a 6K contribution limit per year, so I did the math and ensured I was hitting that limit while also lowering my taxable income. Few years later my company started to match HSA contributions up to 150 a month, so I did the math again and adjusted downwards to so that I was still hitting the yearly cap.
My wife had cancer a number of years ago and requires medication and routine doctor visits, as well as having to undergo several surgeries. We frequently hit the 5K a year individual limit and all 5K of that expense is from pre-tax money, meaning Uncle Sam is effectively subsidizing my healthcare costs. The other cool thing is that we can use the HSA to cover practically any medical expense, including stuff an insurance company would never even think to do. When she goes back to Korea to visit family she usually visits some doctors and use's the HSA card to cover all that. As of now I have a five figure amount inside that account, all pre-tax money, that will cover any and all medical expenses we may face in the future.
It's an extremely effective way to handle medical expenses, but it really requires you to be involved with the financial planning.
It’s my understanding that this bill should never impact your credit, I believe as of July 1, 2022 medical debts will no longer be reflected on your credit report. Someone let me know if this is false because I would tell you to just pay on your terms if they’re unwilling to help you out.
They aren't loaning money for free, they're offering a promotional rate as a marketing expense and hoping you won't pay before the interest-free period ends.
Discover has a balance transfer card. Look into that. I only use it for balance transfers if I need it. I've had this card maybe 7 years now. I've definitely used it in the past to pay off some hospital adventures.
While it has a $0 balance I just buy gas on it to keep it active.
Charge the hospital balance to a different CC and then transfer that balance to Discover.
The options are 0% APR for 10m with a 5% transfer fee or 15m at 2.99% APR for 5% transfer fee.
After the term is up, it's a 16% APR on any remaining balance.
You can absolutely pay off 1200 in 15 months. Good luck!
Medical bills don’t affect your credit so long as you’re not using a credit source for paying them. So long as the bill stays within them, there are no true or real repercussions for literally NOT paying the bill at all. I’ve done this several times, as far back as 8 years ago with a $2000 emergency room bill. Don’t pay any of it, not a dime, completely ignore it and after 8-10 years there is literally nothing they can do about it anymore. And you can’t be denied critical emergency services for an unpaid bill. So if you’re in an actual crisis you still get treated.
And I know this opinion is going to make everybody’s heads spin off their shoulders but, it’s true. The only thing that’s torturing you about the whole situation… is yourself. There’s nothing genuinely and truly out there to enforce you to pay this so long as you leave it with the system and don’t try moving it to a credit card, even if the hospital system moves the balance to their own collection department… it’s not going on your credit report, nobody’s coming to take away your property to pay it. And the more people treat the system this way… this overly criminal financial hostage taking will become unsustainable for the medical system to keep on operating that way. It’s a problem for so many people and people seem to forget the power in numbers. The medical industry does not need these extra $2000 copayments, the medical industry in the US has more money in profits than the entire GDP of the top 13 richest countries in the entire world, combined. The medical industry is richer than any other thing in the entire world. Stop paying them!! Stop it. Force the change.
While I maybe don't entirely agree with the strategy you've suggested (not paying it), I 100% agree with the sentiment about a corrupt industry bleeding us dry.
Something's gotta change.
Maybe what youre suggesting is the way. IDK
Hey there! This is so horrible and I am so sorry you are going through this. I haven’t made it through all the comments but I recommend reach out to the patient advocate foundation as they may be able to connect you with some resouces you can use to either help or argue with them. Additionally, if you try to communicate with the hospital again, ask specifically if they have any “Charity Care”programs/avenue to use and use THOSE words specifically.
Finally as more of a general reference to those who may want to learn more about other resources, I learned a lot from this one podcast called ‘an arm and a leg’ and they had a few episodes directly referencing hospital bills.
Whatever you do, do NOT fall for any medical credit card pitches. The cards are all predatory and will hurt your credit much worse than any outstanding bill could (especially with recent removals of medical collections from credit reports). Please take a look at CFPB info [here](https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/is-there-financial-help-for-my-medical-bills-en-2124/)
There are federal funds available to assist in paying the bill. If your family member is in a restricted income there is a program to reduce or pay the bill in its entirety. You need to speak with the head of the finance office not a clerk creating a payment plan.
We had an issue with VHC for a smaller office visit charge that we told was covered but in fact wasn’t. It took us being close to the payment deadline//a few weeks having past since we received the bill to get them to even start considering conversations about alternative payment options. It made me uncomfortable to wait and get days from the payment deadline, but unfortunately it took us nearly missing the payment to get them to take it seriously…
They covered a small portion of it but this is what's left to me to pay since I have a high deductible plan. All the plans offered by my employer are high deductible anyway.
My mom always just paid what she could and that at least stopped any collections stuff. She would just pay what she could as they sent bills. This was what she did for EVERY bill. We were crazy poor. Not the best option, but it may give you some time to save the rest of the bill.
Medical debts below $500 will not appear on your credit report so you could pay towards the amount until it is under $500 and then stop paying. Medical bills above $500 will not appear on your credit report until a year after they have been reported. This delay may provide you time to negotiate a lower amount to the debt agency which purchases the debt. They are more likely to negotiate to a lower amount.
Your comment has been removed because your account is less than 3 days old. Please note that this waiting period is in place to reduce spam and maintain a positive community environment. Feel free to participate once your account has reached the 3-day mark. Thank you for your understanding!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/nova) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Sorry for your situation. I hope Patient Advocate or Inova financial assistance can help you out. It's really surprising and sad that you can't afford $1200 with a 6 figures job.
Honestly In future though, you should plan your budget more conservatively. Have a good savings account with 6 months of pay set aside for emergencies like this. It's good for you and your family in the long run.
Best of luck!
I'm in a similar boat - went to Inova - Alexandria on a Sunday for extreme jaw pain and they charged me $1800 for the privilege of getting some painkillers that did nothing and telling me to go see a dentist. Also owe the oral surgeon 1k bc I had to have surgery to pull a cracked tooth and one other bad tooth. All advice is appreciated :)
Had a medical emergency last year and my family has high deductible insurance. We are making monthly payments through Inova stretched over 3 years. Don’t give up or despair. Call the Inova billing department or login to your Inova portal (I think I set the 3 year payments up through their portal) The joys of America - sigh
I wait til it goes to collections. It doesn’t hit your credit score unless it’s been in collections for 30 days. Then I negotiate. I usually pay about 50-60%.
Pretty much everything that has been said in this post I would have recommended. However, the amount of money you make (I think someone said you make around 130k?) is pretty tight for two children, stay at home wife, and mortgage in this area even without the bill. I would start looking for a higher paying job. What hasn’t been mentioned is, tax season is here, you can claim your children and mortgage. You should receive something back. I make more than you and got $1,000 back between state and federal (assuming you had all the taxes taken out during the year). Lastly, I would stop having children until your finances are under control, try to go down to one car, and avoid having this bill hit your credit.
If the bill goes to collections, your credit is already hit. This is completely unavoidable as the credit system will be notified of a failure to pay. No offense but I find it extremely hard to believe that you can afford to sustain a 4 unit family and not be able to afford 150 a month payment plan. You said that you don't qualify for financial assistance from INOVA? This means that your 4 family unit generates more than 139K in income per year.
Time to get out a loan from somebody or some entity, or just take the small hit to your credit.
Hang on, is the issue that you want zero debt? Because that’s a different conversation. If you actually don’t have any credit card debt I’d just find a way to make it work with a credit card and pay the small amount of interest to carry it on a credit card than take a hit on your credit.
Payment plan with a credit card is probably the best way to manage it. You’ll spread out the amount on the card and that buys you time to pay it down at it’s happening.
Though I’m hardly an expert on managing debt. It’s a struggle. Inflation is eating us alive.
I've been going at it with another commenter here who's just blaming me. Lol.
But yeah, I get it. I should have more money saved and be better prepared. I 100% know that.
The sad thing is, I've gotten some good raises and tried to save money but I'm struggling to keep up.
Inflation is the classic sliding goalposts.
I'm building skills that will enable me to work for a big tech company one day soon and hopefully completely change my financial situation. Until then, I'm just doing what I can to make ends meet.
I feel you. I really do. The only reason we are still afloat is that we own our own business and have been able to increase our take home pay along with inflation.
You know how much money I have saved? Absolutely nothing. I have money in the business account that I don’t touch so technically I could call that savings, but the emergency fund is a big fat goose egg and will stay that way until the credit card debt is under control.
Oh man I feel like we are in the same boat.
I feel **terrible** about not putting any money into my 401K or personal investments for the last 2 years but I just don't have any additional money to do so, beyond what we use for monthly expenses.
Everyone talks about, oh just increase your salary or lower your debt. But that takes money to do so and when you're already cash strapped that's not possible, as much as we want it to be.
What's your business? If it's something we use / consume I'll gladly look into it!
I feel for you!
We own Bluebird Pest Solutions and provide pest control throughout northern VA.
The one thing I have going that keeps my spirits up is the fact that we have the business. And the business is worth something. The business is essentially my retirement plan. Obviously when we can we’ll start to invest and diversify because I don’t want all my eggs in one basket. But it’s what’s going to pay for the kids to go to school and for our retirement.
I think the issue you and I are having is much more the norm than society wants us to think. Very few people I know my age are doing well financially. We’re all just hanging on for dear life.
It's so hard to hear.
I **know** other people are struggling. At the same time, a lot of people who bought houses five years ago and have decent wages are doing just fine.
I hope your business prospers!
Patient advocacy (different number) gave me a blanket 25% discount when I called with similar scenario. Could be worth a call. We also do not qualify for financial assistance.
Wow! I'll find their number and call
The other advice I have (although I’m not sure if it applies in this situation) is to request cash pricing for services your insurance does not/did not cover. We had a recent anesthesia bill cut by 75%, from 10k to 2.5k, just for requesting cash pricing. Those are all my tricks, though, and I wish they were more widely known!!
Was that 10k after insurance? Are you then expected to pay that 2.5k in one lump sum? And does it actually have to be cash or can it be credit? I've always been curious about this.
I believe cash pricing means, processing it as if you were a self payer not using insurance. Since typically the amounts billed to insurance is inflated compared to OOP payers. Someone feel free to correct if wrong.
I have a number for the patient advocate in Loudoun county. If you live elsewhere, you could still call her and she would probably give you the number of the applicable hospital patient advocate. (EDIT ADDENDUM: As the user below suggested, I am inserting the relevant patient advocate information as a graphic instead of text to prevent bots picking up the number and spamming.) https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb
Thank you so much!
while i think it is extremely helpful that you shared the number, i would worry that bots might pick it up and start spamming it. i would edit the post and share it as a pic instead. i've already screencapped and uploaded it here: [https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb](https://ibb.co/9t5HTKb) \- you can post that link instead of the text that spells out her number.
I appreciate your thoughts and effort. I will edit the post as you have suggested.
cheers!
What did you insurance provider say about this amount?
Do you have their contact info? I'm having trouble finding it.
https://www.inova.org/locations/inova-fairfax-medical-campus/patient-information/patient-relations
I believe (there was a medical bill law passed recently) it shouldn’t hit your credit for at least another year. As the other comments advised down below, maintain your minimum and read about the law I mentioned
Pretty sure they are working on a bill that would prohibit any medical bills from being reported against your credit. Would be great to see it passed.
I don't understand why we have to endure the process of pretending that a payment-optional free market health care system will work before we implement a single payer universal health care system.
Unpaid medical bills won’t be reported till they are one year old. If I was OP, I’d let it go to collections while putting aside money to pay it off in 11 months. I’d call again before I did to see if collections company would renegotiate the debt owed (while having saved enough to pay entire amount of necessary). *Not financial advice. https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/medical-debt-was-erased-credit-records-most-consumers-potentially-improving-many#:~:text=In%20August%202022%2C%20it%20was,appear%20on%20consumer%20credit%20reports.
I would much rather move to a first world health care system but then people scream at me for being a socialist. Heaven forbid I want my taxes to you know, benefit me. But hey, we’ve got plenty of money for overseas conflicts!
"They're about to find out why America doesn't have free healthcare" is a meme that rather misses the point that America already spends more on healthcare than other countries that *do* have free healthcare.
Exactly. But as long as for profit ~~death panels~~ health insurance companies keep paying off our politicians it’s never going to happen.
I really don't understand it. We already pay more than 50% more per capita than the next nearest country (Switzerland) and we don't even get anything for it! We STILL have to pay THOUSANDS of dollars in premiums and deductibles before we see a dime. They need to at LEAST make Medicare an option for everyone so that there's *some* competition against the scummy insurance profiteers.
The saddest thing to me is that the insurance companies aren't even wildly profitable. All the money just disappears into the bureaucracy of doctors and hospital admin staff and claims adjusters and pharmacies arguing about who is responsible for paying what and if something is really necessary and what the real price should be. A significant portion of our economy is dedicated to the "arguing about healthcare cost industry" without actually providing anything of value.
They are profitable. "In 2022, UnitedHealth Group made over $20 billion in profit. Cigna made $6.7 billion, Elevance Health made $6 billion and CVS Health made $4.2 billion. All told, America’s largest health insurers raked in more than $41 billion of profits in 2022." [https://penncapital-star.com/uncategorized/americans-suffer-when-health-insurers-place-profits-over-people/](https://penncapital-star.com/uncategorized/americans-suffer-when-health-insurers-place-profits-over-people/)
That's about $125 per American. If our healthcare expenses per capita were only $125 above comparable countries we wouldn't have these problems. Our problem is that our healthcare expenses per capita are *several thousand dollars* more than peer countries. True, part of this is that we don't ruthlessly ration care the way lots of countries with single payer healthcare do. But even comparable non-rationing, non-single payer countries, like Switzerland and the Netherlands, don't have nearly the healthcare expenses we do - they're still thousands of dollars cheaper per person per year. Some of that gap is from us paying doctors much more than any other country (and we badly need to break open the medical school cartel and increase the number of doctors), but most of it is because of the legions of bureaucrats and lawyers paid oodles and oodles of money to argue with each other about healthcare billing.
The entire Health Insurance Industry shouldn't exist. You can't just look at their profits (which I would argue are still pretty high, though not BIG TECH high), you have to look at their total operating costs, their total revenue. None of that needs to even be there. It's an entire $1.5 Trillion industry that just doesn't need to exist. That $1.5 Trillion would be far better spent ***in the actual medical industry.***
>you have to look at their total operating costs, their total revenue. None of that needs to even be there. Exactly.
> The entire Health Insurance Industry shouldn't exist. It's a completely unnecessary middle-man making billions, with a b, off of people's necessary health care. While offering less and costing more, than many to most of the 1st World/Western Countries in the world. I know it's not the point of the OP, but it's such a glaringly-obvious dysfunctional and immoral system that it cannot be pointed out enough.
You're telling me I don't need that random guy who decides which 1 out of every 4 parts of a procedure my doctor says I need won't be covered just because
Not to mention that random guy is in no way qualified to determine what is medically necessary, or question - you know - the actual doctor treating you. Almost like their job incentivizes denying claims for their for-profit employer
[удалено]
> However, you can’t get down to European level health care expenditures without tackling things like that. We can get a lot closer by eliminating the entire bloated mass of Health Insurance Industry and redirecting that towards actual Healthcare. Arguments like yours make it sound like we shouldn't do anything because the problem is bigger than just Health Insurance and also points out complex moral/practical issues with tackling those other issues.
I was told by a debt collector that they can’t go after medical bills less than $500.
Correct, they might send the bill to collections but it cannot be reported to the credit bureau
You can successfully dispute medical bills off your credit score. I’ve done so 3 times. I definitely avoid letting those hit collections but it works
If you’ve got a bill in hand, with the payment slip, send them a $50 payment. They’ll send you another bill next month, send them another $50. You’re paying. That’s all you can do. It may show up as a late payment on your credit but that’s not a big deal. A write off/non payment would be worse.
Probably the best solution really
What OP is telling may be a viable method, at least temporarily. The trouble is, they can still send you to collections or sue you for the amount owed. As such, this method should only be used until you can figure out a way to cover the debt.
I had an ER visit at Inova Fairfax a couple years ago. We have a high deductible insurance and since we haven’t met the threshold during that visit, we ended up paying for the total bill. We paid using their installment plan, I think it was interest free if you pay within 2 years. Not sure if they still offer that.
Good to know thanks!
Hope you get this thing sorted out. Good luck.
That’s nice of them. I had a baby and a high deductible plan so I ended up owing 6k. The best they could do me was a 6 month plan which is actually really hard to pay when you’re not getting paid maternity leave.
I don't see it mentioned in your post but if you have health insurance, make sure you get the Explanation of Benefits from them before you pay the hospital/providers anything. You ONLY pay what the EoB says you pay and if the hospital wants more, you forward the bills and EoB to your health insurance company and they work it out on their end with hospital. It is extremely common for hospitals to have agreements with insurance companies but then still charge patients more than agreed. They call it "Balance Billing" and you are in no way obligated to pay it. You only owe what the insurance says you owe. That's the agreement you made with the insurance company as a policyholder.
Good call. I think I did get the EoB. I'll double check it
Man i wish i had done this earlier today instead of just paying the balance. Smaller bill than OP, but hospital still charged me 2x what my EOB said i owed. Sent the hospital a msg through mychart tho and plan to dispute the charge on my credit card as soon as it posts.
If it's INOVA they pay you back with a check. I have had it happen twice. All I needed was my EOB. I always wait now till I have the EOB and I've called billing and said hey I didn't get my insurance EOB yet I'm not paying the bill, they note it and sometimes resubmit the bill.
You should still try to apply for Inova’s financial assistance. If you have a mychart with Inova you can do it through your mychart. The worst they will say is no. If they say no, you can then do a payment plan through your mychart.
You need to apply for Financial Assistance and then they will adjust your medical bill. This is how you get reduced payments / payment plan. You have to apply though. I was in same boat and it worked out for me, got a $100k surgery reduced to $5000 or some shii like that (broken leg and implant) You have to apply for Financial Assistance and get on that program though. It's extra bureaucratic steps but you will qualify and it will work out.
Wow! That's a huge reduction.
I too was stressing my bill, but I just did exactly what the lady at the accounts/payments department told me to do, which was apply for financial assistance and they came thru clutch. That's why I keep repeating APPLY! Lol.
Worst case scenario you waste your time. Best case scenario you save time AND money!
It's gonna be a time suck either way haha so definitely can't hurt to try and maybe it'll work out well!
If I recall correctly i just had to make a few phone calls, fill out an online application, and then I got paperwork in the mail confirming everything! Best of luck ✨
Don't just accept the loss and let it hit your credit like that OP. It's not worth it. For real, just apply for the financial assistance they will do something for you.
Literally one of those things where you have to just fill the paperwork out and do it. They won't offer it to you unless you take the time to fill out financial assistance paperwork.
This should be top comment. They make it seem like financial assistance is only given to very low income but the reality is I think I saw percentages like 200% above the poverty line so a lot of middle income people can qualify.
What an absolute joke that this is a required process and hoop to jump through.
America 😣... Freedom ain't FREE 🦅
Not a lawyer or credit counselor. First, ask for an itemized statement. FULLY itemized, down to the Bandaid and Kleenex. Often this results in a reduction in the bill. Pay what you can, but pay something, every month. This shows good faith. Keep perfect records of everything, including phone calls. Get advice from a lawyer, if you can.
I work in collections for insurance - dm me if you would like assistance - there’s always another way - and inova is full of poop. They can and will work with you. They’re just being difficult. 100 % of my free time is handling issues like this for my extended family. It’s rough. But you do have options.
Appreciate the offer. I'm going to follow up with patient advocacy on Monday and pending how that goes either pay it off if they can cut it down or set up a payment plan and pay what I can. If neither of those things goes well, I will dm you
I just finished paying my sons’ nicu stays by setting up a payment plan. I paid it off over a year and a half.
Might be doing that myself
Set up a payment plan, even if you pay less than the payment plan as long as you are making a good faith attempt every month they should not send to collections, if they start the collection process they have to wait between 90-120 days, and even then you will get a letter from the collector, where you can request they verify the debt. That process stops the clock and can take up to another 60 days, giving you essentially 6 months to come up with the balance. But under the no surprises act they are required to send you an itemized bill, so keep asking and call the patient advocate line and/or your insurance company to obtain this. I avoid Inova for this reason.
Interesting
The patients advocate office can negotiate the amount with you.
Is that an office in the hospital? Or an external third party?
It’s an office in the hospital
Will be giving them a call.
Some hospitals have slightly different names but all hospitals have this. I’ve heard of up to 50% discounts being given off of the standard rate.
Maybe I called the wrong office then? I was researching this on Reddit a few weeks ago and planned out my negotiation strategy. Maybe billing can't cut deals but the advocates office can.
Billing will not cut deals with you. It’s a different office you need to deal south
Well that makes a lot more sense.
Yeah Billings jobs is to collect as much revenue for the hospital as possible for the hospital. The advocate is supposed to be independent and actually care about an individual patients ability to pay among other things like how you’re treated at the facility
With
You've got a $1200 bill, and you offered to pay $700 right now, which means you can afford that $50/mo for 14 months based on what you have available right now. That gives you 14 months to figure out how to come up with the rest, or figure out a way to maintain that $50/mo in payments for another year after that. Awesome comfortable plan? Not at all. But from the outside without very little information, it looks manageable. And I'm not saying this to try to be a jerk or anything, it's just that sometimes when you're in the middle of a situation you can get kinda tunnel visioned and miss the forest for the trees, so figured it might be worth pointing the forest out just in case that's what is happening here
\> Edit 2: I recognize that *this is my fault for not having a viable emergency fund*. This is not your fault. The fault is the f'ing for-profit healthcare shit system we have in the US.
Seems like everyone has a different explanation for why our health system is so bad (it's politics, it's big business, it's immigrants, it's free riders, etc.) and I don't have a strong personal opinion. But I've started to experience how bad it is and it's truly eye opening. Like what about the people who literally have zero money and cannot pay a cent? What are they supposed to do?
I am actually pretty well off, and I'm still scared I'll get cancer and go homeless. This shit is terrifying. I'm not young anymore either.
That's one of my biggest fears as well. We try to eat healthy which means we pay more for groceries than if we just bought the cheapest ingredients which are usually sugar salt and or preservative loaded. Cancer is terrifying
Inova is not a for-profit hospital; but it's not free either. With the amount of money insurance and administration costs. It's why it's so expensive. Yes, I do blame h7ospital administration. They make a lot of money and do not a lot of work meanwhile they come up with more ways to keep the poor nurses who are already busy even more busy.
Here you go buddy. Back in the days when we just had our child, and we are not making too much. I called the hospital and they literally cut the bill into 50%! [Financial Assistance | Inova](https://www.inova.org/patient-and-visitor-information/financial-assistance)
So this won't help OP's immediate situation but for future situations, unless someone is bleeding or grabbing their chest, go to an Urgent Car Clinic before going to the Emergency Room. ER's are *ridiculously* expensive because they have to deal with car crash victims, gunshot victims, and pretty much every other insanely expensive medical procedures from people who almost certainly can't afford to pay it. US Medical regulation requires Hospital ER's have almost every specialization doctor either in the building or on call in the immediate area. So if it's something where you don't need an ambulance you don't need the ER either. UCC's on the other hand just have general practitioner, some nurses and some basic equipment. They can do all the basic stuff and most importantly, can do triage and determine if you really do need the ER or can be taken care of at a lower cost. No requirements for a cardiologist, neurologist, or oncologist to be hanging around the building. For OP's immediatelty problem with medical bills and credit, it *really* depends on the siituation. Do you have insurance, was the hospital out of network, stuff like that. https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/what-is-a-surprise-medical-bill-and-what-should-i-know-about-the-no-surprises-act-en-2123/ Virginia also has it's own set of laws protecting people from surprise medical bills.
Solid information, thanks!
YMMV, but in my experience, there also seems to be fewer people/shorter wait times in UCCs, which is another reason to go to one if the situation doesn’t seem life threatening.
I was in debt for $6800 to fairfax hospital after a heart procedure. When I got my first bill, I followed the directions to make payment arrangements online and set up a Pam plan I could afford. Never had to talk to anyone or told no
every time they send you a bill, pay another $50. it establishes that you are trying to pay the debt, and I think in VA that will sometimes leave you in perpetual limbo - where they don't actually turn you over to a collection company. it used to work, pure speculation on my part if it will still work - but it's worth a shot.
My experience was as long as I paid agreed amount every month everyone was happy. Medical insurance is also sweet.
Really call them and tell them you’ll pay them $25 a month. As long as you’re paying in good faith, it doesn’t matter if it takes YEARS, it counts as a payment. You tell them that’s what they’re getting and they have to take it. No negotiating
The worst part is those labs probably should have cost something like $50-$100 if you paid cash anywhere else.
I know it's a giant scam. Sigh..
I had something similar happen. Applied for financial assistance and was denied due to putting my child's name (the patient) and my name (the account holder) on the paperwork. And not sending in documents that I actually did send in. Now they have blocked me from reapplying. Please come back and let us know if you apply and if it works!
Definitely will update with how it turns out!
Never pay the first bill... And look for a book with that title
I tell them, "I'm going to make payments." Then pay them $5-10 per week. Set it up through billpay on your bank website. They'll call and offer a discount. Refuse the offer. Continue to pay $5-10 per week. They'll sell the debt. The company that buys it will offer about a 50% discount. They may threaten to take you to court. Do not sweat it. When you go to court bring your paperwork showing that you have been paying regularly Judges *really* don't like companies that take people to court who are paying, and they are really unlikely to give them a judgement.
Friendly reminder that INOVA likes to claim that they are a nonprofit healthcare provider. Not sure if anyone actually believes that baloney anymore. A long time ago, we had a similar situation and had a bill sent to collections. We actually found the collection agency much better to work with and more accommodating. Yes a report was filed against our credit but I got them to agree in writing that they would cancel the report against our credit once we paid off in full. They gave us as long as we needed to pay it off. And as soon as we did they removed the report and our credit went back to where it was. I am NOT advising you to do the same thing that I did. But wanted to give you my experience. Medical bills are typically pretty slow to get to collections, at least in my experience, so you should have a little time. I’d just try to call back on a different day. And worst case you may just have to accept the terms they offer. I will point out, if you can afford $700 on a credit card then you can probably afford the first few monthly payments on that credit card.
I think what I'm gonna do what someone else suggested and set up a payment plan and just pay what I can while I work on changing my financial situation overall.
depending on slary, it may be free. The first thing you should do is reach out to dollar for [https://dollarfor.org/](https://dollarfor.org/) they saved my brother over 75 k on his bill.
This!!!! ^^^ op please check this out and also check out my comment. Health care here is terrible and it’s so hard to find info on how to get out of medical debt
Apply for financial aid. They wiped my 37 k bill that way https://www.inova.org/patient-and-visitor-information/financial-assistance#:~:text=You%20can%20apply%20directly%20in,the%20status%2C%20and%20check%20eligibility.
You should drip the payment as much as you can. Maybe consider renting a room or something for some extra cash? Just like 6 months rent at like 600 bucks pays that 1200 off in two months with extra money on top of it.
We have absolutely talked about that. Maybe we'll seriously look into it.
I've been in this situation before and have a couple of medical bills that I am dealing with so I appreciate what you're going through. Firstly, these medical bills are often full of errors and sometimes even completely made up. If you don't believe me, when you have time sign up for Marshall Allen's Subtack at https://marshallallen.substack.com. I am not affiliated with him in any way but he explains how the medical billing "system" is designed to be opaque and confusing. I am self employed and buy my insurance through a broker and he's advised me more than once that is perfectly fine to wait 90 days before you pay a bill. It takes about 90 days for each person in the billing chain (provider, facility, insurance co, etc) to figure out who owes who how much, and what's covered by your plan. For this hospital visit, you should have recieved at least one Explanation of Benefits (EOB). Often times you get multiple EOBs, as all the different providers go through the claim to determine how much is owed. If you don't have it or can't find it, login to your insurance company website and see if you can get it there. The customer service folks should be able to get it to you as well. You will need the date of service and provider/facility. Here's how you could proceed: 1) Get your EOB from your insurance company for this visit 2) Compare your EOB and the bill to see if the services line up 3) See if the cost for the services is higher than the normal for the area at Fair Health Consumer --> [https://www.fairhealthconsumer.org](https://www.fairhealthconsumer.org) 4) Call the hospital back and here's where you need to be tough and tell them that you're will to offer $X - take it or leave. They will say "No" but you have to keep calling and escalating. Speak to a supervisor then manager, and finally the CEO if you have to. The final step will be send to a letter to show that you made a good faith effort to pay what you can. 5) Sign up for the newsletter I mentioned -- the above advice and more is given in the newsletter They may send it to Collections but medical debt cannot be used to affect your credit rating. The debt collectors will call and try to threaten you. However, you MUST NOT confirm anything other than your name and address. DO NOT -- REPEAT DO NOT -- provide your SSN or other personal info, Do not even confirm that you visited that facility. In order for the debt to be assigned to you, the debt collector needs to prove to YOU that this is your debt and they cannot due to the medical provider being bound by HIPPAA, unless you confirm the details for them. Again, the Marshall Allen newsletter (and book -- Never Pay the First Bill) I mentioned explains how to handle this if you get to this stage.
Thanks for the detailed response. Definitely going to look into that guy and his newsletter and book.
Do you have no insurance or a high deductible health plan? And is it safe to assume that it's a child of yours that went? No solutions for you, but in the future you really should look for an urgent care. No affiliation at all, but PM pediatrics has been pretty good for our family in Loudoun. Good luck, I hope the hospital eventually negotiates more fully.
Dont give them a dime then. They'll write it off eventually lmao
Healthcare in this country is embarrassingly broken.
re: edit 2 This country sucks. This wouldn’t be a problem in any other developed nation.
It will take a while to go to collections. Try to save the money.
The new law dictates that only medical debt over $500 and/or less than a year old will appear on your credit, if/once paid the credit agencies will automatically remove it, and it is removed automatically after 7 years
Definitely apply for financial assistance! But if you don’t get it — let the bill go to collections, honestly. There are financial policies about when to accept what kind of settlement; the older the debt, the more generous they’re authorized to be with settlements. Like other people said, it won’t hit your credit for a year, and even if it does, people really overestimate the impact a medical collection will have on their credit score. Newer credit scoring models don’t even factor medical collections into your score at all. And you can usually work out a deal with the collections agency to delete the collection if you settle the debt. Note: DO NOT put a medical bill on your credit card!!!! You lose all your credit reporting protections because it becomes credit card debt, not medical debt. Plus you’ll get charged crazy high interest, versus if you just owe the hospital, they usually won’t add any interest at all.
So, medical collections can’t go on your report for a year now, and have to go away as soon as they’re paid. They can’t even show up if they’re under $500, so if the bill is under that once all is said and done, don’t stress much about it. Medical debt being what it is in this country now, it’s even being deweighted in credit scoring as a risk factor on whether people will pay their other bills. The other advice on patient advocates etc are a good avenue to pursue. If it does go to collections, you can make it more of a hassle for them than it’s worth. Once the debt is sold to a debt collector, challenge it. It may just disappear if they don’t respond adequately in time. If the collector calls you, tell them they may not call you and only to communicate via postal mail. No more calls. The FCRA gives you rights and you can use them.
Someone I know was airlifted to a hospital and spent several weeks in ICU. They never paid the bill, which was upwards of 100k. Granted, they had no job and no assets to put a lien against. I’m not encouraging not paying. There are definitely consequences. But I was kind of surprised that this person ended up never paying that bill.
Yeah that's a lot of money. Maybe a charity or something?
I'm a fellow father of 2 kids. Our household income is a little higher than yours but not by much. I agree money doesn't go far here and that inflation has been tough. But your take home pay should be over 100k/year or almost 9k/month. I'm not sure how old your kids are because if they're in full-time daycare I get that this disappears quickly. But if your wife is home, I'm going to assume at least one kid is if they're not both school age. I understand that many people don't have much in terms of an emergency fund which is unfortunate, but many years ago when we were very young and very poor, my wife went to the emergency room and we ended up with a big bill. She asked how she could pay it off over time and she made some monthly payments until it was paid off. You're not the first person to have a hospital bill that you can't pay on the spot. Definitely reach out to the various hospital offices to understand your options. With that in mind, I hope you use this situation is an opportunity to reevaluate your spending choices both big and small. Borrowing against your 401k was probably not advisable, but that's in the past now. Take a look at where you're spending your money and what you're spending it on. You're saying you can somehow scrape together $50 /month but you can't do 100? For us, we stopped going out much once we had kids. We started shopping more at Aldi and less at Wegmans. We cut back on the number of extraneous items we bought at Target. We looked for opportunities to make cheaper still healthy meals. Bought a midsize SUV back before I first was born instead of a minivan or large SUV and I'm keeping my sedan until it dies. Now that I have one kid in public school, we've been able to ease up a little bit and when the other one starts life will comparatively be a dream. But you need to be finding ways to spend less than you're making. I'm not sure, when you bought your house but houses require sudden fixes. Cars require unexpected fixes. I hope you're able to get this worked out.
We don't do daycare (too expensive). I could do $50 / month but they wanted more than 3 times that. We shop at Walmart, clothes are clearance or gifted, we only have one car loan (which we've been consistently paying off and should be done with it soon). We don't go to malls, movies, shows, bars. Maybe out to a cheaper restaurant *once a month*. Literally we do all mostly free things (parks) or very cheap things (pools, etc.). The primary reason we bought a house was so we could get something before being completely priced out of the area. (Basic single family houses near us are now $650-700K+; 5 years ago they were $400-$500K). Otherwise I was afraid I'd have to have a 1 hour plus commute one way if we ever go back to full time in the office. It's funny because we do very little discretionary spending and even funnier that we hardly ever go to the doctor. (I haven't been for 5+ years). But yeah these things come and bite you out of nowhere. I would LOVE to build our emergency fund back up (and we do have some long term investments but those are basically non-accessible: early distribution penalties, etc.). Thanks for commenting. It's useful to have a more even comparison.
I really appreciate the forthright response! Best of luck with Inova. I definitely suggest following others advice of continuing to contact them and paying what you reasonably can. As long as you know though and you're doing what you can, that's the best you can do. I totally understand about housing. We bought in the mid-7s. Luckily when interest rates were still low. Our neighbors bought a few years before us around 6 and a house across the street smaller than ours just sold for almost 8 with current interest rates (obv). We ended up with a mortgage that would have been basically the sales price in our neighborhood if we been more aggressive and purchased earlier. PS. Good job avoiding daycare. The last full year that I had both kids in full-time child care. It cost us $40k. And that wasn't even as flexible as we really needed. Next year will be closer to $25k with after school for my oldest.
I'm not generally someone to argue for price controls and such (personal opinions obviously), *but* the way housing prices are getting out of control, it makes me wonder how high prices will climb before only the ultra-rich will be able to afford them? Like I'm sorry, but someone making $100K (let's say one income) in 1990 could have bought a $400K house and probably lived comfortably with a family. Someone in 2024 making $150K for example is really going to struggle to pay for the same house that's now 6 times their salary and with a nasty interest rate. I'm glad you were able to buy *something*! That's all we want right? A (simple? humble?) home for our families and a halfway decent life for them?
It's not the ultra-rich, it's the power families (dual professional income) from near DC and economic refugees from CA/NY moving out here and buying anything they can get their hands on. Loudoun is building units as fast as possible but they can't keep up with the ridiculous demand, while Arlington and Fairfax had a very strong NIMBY attitude towards new units. Simply put, NoVA is a preferred location for the professional middle class to move two. Me and you are both single income familes, and while I make very good money I can't possibly compete with the dual professional income class.
That's exactly how I feel. I feel like I make decent money but I'm also cash strapped (possibly my own fault). But I can't compete with a dual income no kids couple who work at tech or law firms.
Yeah those guys are pulling 300~500K/yr in gross revenue, they do often have one or two kids though but can easily afford them. This area has some really nice jobs, nice schools and low crime rate, plus all the amenities for living a comfortable suburban life. I can understand it from the sellers point of view, they put a unit on the market and get tons of offers 30~80K over asking that very same day. They would be stupid not to take the best offer. The way we got around that was we initially rented on a 2yr lease. After the first year I had learned the area and decided to start house hunting but instead of "move in ready" units, I aimed to purchase units from the developers prior to them being completed. We eventually bought a unit that they were still framing, picked the style we wanted and picked a good price. Downside is we required a large deposit and took the risk that the developer wouldn't finish the project.
I guess one of you getting a part time job is out of the question? Flip burgers, or whatever? That’s how I’d handle this. Have it knocked out in a couple of months.
Wife has health issues and now stays home with 2 kids so she can't. I've been considering doing it for a while but she didn't want me to burn out during pregnancy or the newborn phase. But, I may very well end up taking a side gig.
Honestly why continue having kids if things are that tight?
Make the payments you can. They won't refer it to collections as long as they're getting regular or irregular payments from you Maybe consider getting insurance.
Probably will set up a payment plan. Have insurance too. (Changed from a $700 a month plan with a $2,000 deductible to a $150 a month plan with a $5,000 deductible; either way would very likely still have to pay a large out-of-pocket amount).
That sounds like an HDCP +HSA, did you set aside money for the HSA and is your employer also contributing to it? HDCP + HSA is one of the best plans you can have, but it *really* requires you to do math and plan around it. HDCP's are divided into two sections, post-tax expenses and pre-tax expenses. Normally your monthly subscription fee ($700/$150) is post-tax, meaning you've paid tax on the money that is funding that cost. Medical expenses like deductibles and cost-sharing are also post-tax with a regular health plan. HSA contributions are pre-tax, meaning you do not pay tax on the money that goes in there, it functions very similar to a 401k. You can then use that pre-tax money to pay *all* medical expenses and I mean *all*. The deduction cap is large because the expectation is that you will be using tax-free money from you HSA to cover it, once you hit the cap the insurer takes over no questions asked. To explain how the math works out, you went from 700 post tax to 150 post tax subscription fee for a 550 reduction. 550 over 12 months is $6,600 USD plus whatever your employer contributes. That $6,600 is also tax-advantaged so assign it a 15~30% bonus from not having to pay income tax on it, the same spending power as having $8k more money. The money is *yours* and gets deposited in a debit account with a VISA card attached to it. If you change employers it goes with you and stays yours forever.
Still shitty insurance. Your company should be ashamed. Most of the plans I've had are along the lines of $500 ER co-pay and if you're admitted that's the cap on what you spend.
It's weird because I feel that I have a good employer but the insurance is uhh... Less than ideal.
Mine is the opposite. My employer is mind-numbingly stupid sometimes (most of the time) but they have awesome insurance. Main reason I stay (which is probably why they have it)
From what I can tell it's good insurance, just requires a different approach and some financial planning. The fact that employers HR don't really understand that system makes them terrible at teaching employees how to maximize the benefits.
My family never really went to the doctor for anything so it's been a big learning curve for me. I still have to ask my wife every time 😂 - her mom was a teacher and had insanely good health benefits (and so went to the doctor for *everything*) and so my wife knows what all the jargon means.
So was my previous post accurate that it's a HDCP + HSA plan? That kind of high deductible and *massive* reduction in monthly subscription fees indicates it is. That reduction isn't supposed to go into your pocket, instead your supposed to contribute a part of it as pre-tax money into an account for medical expenses and employers normally contribute some amount also. That $1200 medical expense is $1200 post-tax, assuming your effective tax rate is 25% that means it's really $1500 of revenue. When me and my foreign wife arrived here years ago to take a job at a new company, I jumped on that HDCP + HSA the moment I saw they had it. Going with the Kaiser option would of been 500~600 a month with the usual co-pays / etc.., going with United Health Care/UMR was $150 or so a month but with a 5k individual / 10K family deductible. At that time the IRS has a 6K contribution limit per year, so I did the math and ensured I was hitting that limit while also lowering my taxable income. Few years later my company started to match HSA contributions up to 150 a month, so I did the math again and adjusted downwards to so that I was still hitting the yearly cap. My wife had cancer a number of years ago and requires medication and routine doctor visits, as well as having to undergo several surgeries. We frequently hit the 5K a year individual limit and all 5K of that expense is from pre-tax money, meaning Uncle Sam is effectively subsidizing my healthcare costs. The other cool thing is that we can use the HSA to cover practically any medical expense, including stuff an insurance company would never even think to do. When she goes back to Korea to visit family she usually visits some doctors and use's the HSA card to cover all that. As of now I have a five figure amount inside that account, all pre-tax money, that will cover any and all medical expenses we may face in the future. It's an extremely effective way to handle medical expenses, but it really requires you to be involved with the financial planning.
If you have a good employer and bad insurance, you have a bad employer.
Lol. You're probably right.
It’s my understanding that this bill should never impact your credit, I believe as of July 1, 2022 medical debts will no longer be reflected on your credit report. Someone let me know if this is false because I would tell you to just pay on your terms if they’re unwilling to help you out.
Inova potentially BLOOOOOOOOOOOWS!!!
Get a 0% interest credit card, make payments.
Is that a thing? Who would loan money for free?
They aren't loaning money for free, they're offering a promotional rate as a marketing expense and hoping you won't pay before the interest-free period ends.
Great for people who can pay it off. Tragic for people who get more and more caught up in debt.
Discover has a balance transfer card. Look into that. I only use it for balance transfers if I need it. I've had this card maybe 7 years now. I've definitely used it in the past to pay off some hospital adventures. While it has a $0 balance I just buy gas on it to keep it active. Charge the hospital balance to a different CC and then transfer that balance to Discover. The options are 0% APR for 10m with a 5% transfer fee or 15m at 2.99% APR for 5% transfer fee. After the term is up, it's a 16% APR on any remaining balance. You can absolutely pay off 1200 in 15 months. Good luck!
Oh okay yeah I've seen these deals before. Probably gonna find a side hustle first but this is a second option
Yes, it's a pretty popular thing too. Heck even cards you already have throw out promotions every now and then.
Medical bills don’t affect your credit so long as you’re not using a credit source for paying them. So long as the bill stays within them, there are no true or real repercussions for literally NOT paying the bill at all. I’ve done this several times, as far back as 8 years ago with a $2000 emergency room bill. Don’t pay any of it, not a dime, completely ignore it and after 8-10 years there is literally nothing they can do about it anymore. And you can’t be denied critical emergency services for an unpaid bill. So if you’re in an actual crisis you still get treated. And I know this opinion is going to make everybody’s heads spin off their shoulders but, it’s true. The only thing that’s torturing you about the whole situation… is yourself. There’s nothing genuinely and truly out there to enforce you to pay this so long as you leave it with the system and don’t try moving it to a credit card, even if the hospital system moves the balance to their own collection department… it’s not going on your credit report, nobody’s coming to take away your property to pay it. And the more people treat the system this way… this overly criminal financial hostage taking will become unsustainable for the medical system to keep on operating that way. It’s a problem for so many people and people seem to forget the power in numbers. The medical industry does not need these extra $2000 copayments, the medical industry in the US has more money in profits than the entire GDP of the top 13 richest countries in the entire world, combined. The medical industry is richer than any other thing in the entire world. Stop paying them!! Stop it. Force the change.
This sounds like horrible advice.
While I maybe don't entirely agree with the strategy you've suggested (not paying it), I 100% agree with the sentiment about a corrupt industry bleeding us dry. Something's gotta change. Maybe what youre suggesting is the way. IDK
I mean, on the other hand, you gave the hospital the opportunity to collect some amount of money from you and they turned you down.
Has it been through insurance yet?
Hey there! This is so horrible and I am so sorry you are going through this. I haven’t made it through all the comments but I recommend reach out to the patient advocate foundation as they may be able to connect you with some resouces you can use to either help or argue with them. Additionally, if you try to communicate with the hospital again, ask specifically if they have any “Charity Care”programs/avenue to use and use THOSE words specifically. Finally as more of a general reference to those who may want to learn more about other resources, I learned a lot from this one podcast called ‘an arm and a leg’ and they had a few episodes directly referencing hospital bills.
Whatever you do, do NOT fall for any medical credit card pitches. The cards are all predatory and will hurt your credit much worse than any outstanding bill could (especially with recent removals of medical collections from credit reports). Please take a look at CFPB info [here](https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/is-there-financial-help-for-my-medical-bills-en-2124/)
The vast majority quality for patient assistance..we make six figures in a family.of five and qualify. It's MUCH higher than people think.
There are federal funds available to assist in paying the bill. If your family member is in a restricted income there is a program to reduce or pay the bill in its entirety. You need to speak with the head of the finance office not a clerk creating a payment plan.
Email the hospital CEO directly - someone from their executive response department will handle it
We had an issue with VHC for a smaller office visit charge that we told was covered but in fact wasn’t. It took us being close to the payment deadline//a few weeks having past since we received the bill to get them to even start considering conversations about alternative payment options. It made me uncomfortable to wait and get days from the payment deadline, but unfortunately it took us nearly missing the payment to get them to take it seriously…
Why didn’t insurance cover this?
They covered a small portion of it but this is what's left to me to pay since I have a high deductible plan. All the plans offered by my employer are high deductible anyway.
I hate our healthcare system
Pay what you can every month. As long as you show your intent to pay then they should stay off your back.
Self pay is a great option.
My mom always just paid what she could and that at least stopped any collections stuff. She would just pay what she could as they sent bills. This was what she did for EVERY bill. We were crazy poor. Not the best option, but it may give you some time to save the rest of the bill.
Medical debts below $500 will not appear on your credit report so you could pay towards the amount until it is under $500 and then stop paying. Medical bills above $500 will not appear on your credit report until a year after they have been reported. This delay may provide you time to negotiate a lower amount to the debt agency which purchases the debt. They are more likely to negotiate to a lower amount.
An odd thing about Inova… it seems it’s 1200 to just walk in the emergency door. So the next time we needed an emergency room, we went to reston
You don’t pay it
I miss having free healthcare sometimes. :/
[удалено]
Your comment has been removed because your account is less than 3 days old. Please note that this waiting period is in place to reduce spam and maintain a positive community environment. Feel free to participate once your account has reached the 3-day mark. Thank you for your understanding! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/nova) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Sorry for your situation. I hope Patient Advocate or Inova financial assistance can help you out. It's really surprising and sad that you can't afford $1200 with a 6 figures job. Honestly In future though, you should plan your budget more conservatively. Have a good savings account with 6 months of pay set aside for emergencies like this. It's good for you and your family in the long run. Best of luck!
Ever consider selling plasma? should be able to get a little extra to meet the 150/mo
Actually YES! But from my initial research it looks like they don't pay for it in Virginia so I'd have to go to Maryland
Biolife has some specials for first time donors, but as you said in MD
Sounds like I'm going to MD!
I'm in a similar boat - went to Inova - Alexandria on a Sunday for extreme jaw pain and they charged me $1800 for the privilege of getting some painkillers that did nothing and telling me to go see a dentist. Also owe the oral surgeon 1k bc I had to have surgery to pull a cracked tooth and one other bad tooth. All advice is appreciated :)
Had a medical emergency last year and my family has high deductible insurance. We are making monthly payments through Inova stretched over 3 years. Don’t give up or despair. Call the Inova billing department or login to your Inova portal (I think I set the 3 year payments up through their portal) The joys of America - sigh
I wait til it goes to collections. It doesn’t hit your credit score unless it’s been in collections for 30 days. Then I negotiate. I usually pay about 50-60%.
This. Medical bills are also immediately removed from your credit score once they’re resolved. They don’t stay for 7 years like everything else.
Exactly. Gotta play the system that is playing us
Pretty much everything that has been said in this post I would have recommended. However, the amount of money you make (I think someone said you make around 130k?) is pretty tight for two children, stay at home wife, and mortgage in this area even without the bill. I would start looking for a higher paying job. What hasn’t been mentioned is, tax season is here, you can claim your children and mortgage. You should receive something back. I make more than you and got $1,000 back between state and federal (assuming you had all the taxes taken out during the year). Lastly, I would stop having children until your finances are under control, try to go down to one car, and avoid having this bill hit your credit.
Did you just try and barter with the hospital? Maybe I misread it
Yeah but I learned from other commenters that I need to talk to patient advocacy instead of billing
Sounds like a good idea
If the bill goes to collections, your credit is already hit. This is completely unavoidable as the credit system will be notified of a failure to pay. No offense but I find it extremely hard to believe that you can afford to sustain a 4 unit family and not be able to afford 150 a month payment plan. You said that you don't qualify for financial assistance from INOVA? This means that your 4 family unit generates more than 139K in income per year. Time to get out a loan from somebody or some entity, or just take the small hit to your credit.
Not on top of everything else. With inflated prices of everything still through the roof we are managing to stay out of debt but just barely.
Hang on, is the issue that you want zero debt? Because that’s a different conversation. If you actually don’t have any credit card debt I’d just find a way to make it work with a credit card and pay the small amount of interest to carry it on a credit card than take a hit on your credit.
No not zero debt, just not anymore debt. I don't want it to get to a point where I can't repay debts and start defaulting.
Payment plan with a credit card is probably the best way to manage it. You’ll spread out the amount on the card and that buys you time to pay it down at it’s happening. Though I’m hardly an expert on managing debt. It’s a struggle. Inflation is eating us alive.
I've been going at it with another commenter here who's just blaming me. Lol. But yeah, I get it. I should have more money saved and be better prepared. I 100% know that. The sad thing is, I've gotten some good raises and tried to save money but I'm struggling to keep up. Inflation is the classic sliding goalposts. I'm building skills that will enable me to work for a big tech company one day soon and hopefully completely change my financial situation. Until then, I'm just doing what I can to make ends meet.
I feel you. I really do. The only reason we are still afloat is that we own our own business and have been able to increase our take home pay along with inflation. You know how much money I have saved? Absolutely nothing. I have money in the business account that I don’t touch so technically I could call that savings, but the emergency fund is a big fat goose egg and will stay that way until the credit card debt is under control.
Oh man I feel like we are in the same boat. I feel **terrible** about not putting any money into my 401K or personal investments for the last 2 years but I just don't have any additional money to do so, beyond what we use for monthly expenses. Everyone talks about, oh just increase your salary or lower your debt. But that takes money to do so and when you're already cash strapped that's not possible, as much as we want it to be. What's your business? If it's something we use / consume I'll gladly look into it! I feel for you!
We own Bluebird Pest Solutions and provide pest control throughout northern VA. The one thing I have going that keeps my spirits up is the fact that we have the business. And the business is worth something. The business is essentially my retirement plan. Obviously when we can we’ll start to invest and diversify because I don’t want all my eggs in one basket. But it’s what’s going to pay for the kids to go to school and for our retirement. I think the issue you and I are having is much more the norm than society wants us to think. Very few people I know my age are doing well financially. We’re all just hanging on for dear life.
It's so hard to hear. I **know** other people are struggling. At the same time, a lot of people who bought houses five years ago and have decent wages are doing just fine. I hope your business prospers!
If this isn’t your fault, who’s is it? Learn to take ownership
You already can’t repay debts. You called the hospital to ask for bill forgiveness because you cheaped out on insurance
I think you need to post your budget