OK, so I'm only interested in your opinion if you...
A: are currently employed in the field of law
B: are currently a law student close to graduation
C: fall under A or B AND have the patience to read this post without asking for cliffs (the details are important)
Here goes:
Over the past year my wife and I have had a hard struggle with a cronic medical condition she has concerning her back, spine, and brain (these details are not so important). Last fall we were seen at a local hospital that shall remain nameless amongst several other hospitals. Durring our travels to meet with a cornucopia of various specalists across the greater Southwest and parts of California one particular hospital bill went into collections unbeknownst to us (this detail is of core importance).
After my wife's last visit to Cedars Sinai in LA where a very specialized procedure was performed she began getting much better and was able to eventually start going back to work after more than a year of being mostly incapacitated. With life returning to a pseudo sense of normalcy I began taking on the monumental task of paying back past due hospital bills and settling our debts that had occured durring her illness.
As of late January I thought I had repaid all debts and things were settled. Including the debts accrued at the one particular hospital of which this thread is the focus. You see when I called this hospital to repay any bills due I very explicitly asked the billing agent if there were ANY outstanding balances I should be made aware of regarding past due accounts and I was assured that there were not!
Fast forward to today and we find out that on 20 Feb 08, there has been a collection placed against my wife's credit report and after some investigation we find out it is an account turned over to collections from the hospital in question that my wife had been to a few times durring her course of treatment. So I called this hospital with my credit card statement in hand showing a charge to this hospital prepared to fully dispute this collection action. It turns out that my payment was on an account (they apparently make a new account each time a patient visits) other than this one that was quitely in collections with a balance due. All of this AFTER I specifically asked the rep back in January if there were any other charges, accounts, etc. I needed to be made aware of.....anything at all that could surprise me and I was VERY specific about this.
To sum it up, had I known this "other" account existed and was in collections at the time I was paying everything off in January, I could have and more importantly WOULD have taken care of it then before anything was posted on any credit reports. As it is, since the billing rep told me everything was square back in January AND I took their word for it, this collection action has now been posted on my wife's credit report.
When I asked the rep today how this could have happened they fed me a line about how this account was in collections prior to the day I called and how once an account goes to collections it shows up as inactive in their system...blah blah blah. To which I replied "but you clearly have visibility of all the accounts tied to this patient right now... yes??" And the answer from them was in fact yes but this is only because today I was asking them to specifically look into all the accounts active or not.
I then made it clear and explaied how I was asking for this EXACT same information the last time I called. Then they tried to argue with how they had sent letters and left phone messages and so on. To this I replied that regardless of how many letters went out or how many phone calls were left the fact remains that had I been given the correct information I was requesting in the first place when I tried to take care of things in January, this collection would not be on my wife's report today. Not to mention the fact that because this lady today was able to successfully give me all the information on all accounts related to my wife's hospital visits flat out PROOVES that it was very possible to give me this information the first time I called yet they still try to circle back around to their arguments of how they sent out letters and got no reply etc. etc.
The fact of the matter is that I DID reply on January 30th and in good faith attempted to resolve any and all unpaid bills including any collections actions. Furthermore I remember being very specific upon requesting information concerning any and all charges outstanding (including any collection actions)
Point blank - the people in this billing department failed me when I requested the information that could have enabled me to prevent all of this and now it feels like there is nothing left to do except suck it up and take it in the ass for 7 more years.
I'm a stand up guy who is fair dealing and I can accept that hey there was this account in collections and it was our responsibility to act in time to take care of it. What I can't accept is that when I tried to do the right thing I got set up for failure. I also typically hate those who try to play the victem but in this case I feel like I got f*cked because someone else failed to provide me with some very crucial information after I made a reasonable and honest attempt to collect said information.
There must be some kind of legal recourse I can take against these chuckleheads.
Suggestions from the legally savvy?
:|
-Thanks for listening (err... reading.)
A: are currently employed in the field of law
B: are currently a law student close to graduation
C: fall under A or B AND have the patience to read this post without asking for cliffs (the details are important)
Here goes:
Over the past year my wife and I have had a hard struggle with a cronic medical condition she has concerning her back, spine, and brain (these details are not so important). Last fall we were seen at a local hospital that shall remain nameless amongst several other hospitals. Durring our travels to meet with a cornucopia of various specalists across the greater Southwest and parts of California one particular hospital bill went into collections unbeknownst to us (this detail is of core importance).
After my wife's last visit to Cedars Sinai in LA where a very specialized procedure was performed she began getting much better and was able to eventually start going back to work after more than a year of being mostly incapacitated. With life returning to a pseudo sense of normalcy I began taking on the monumental task of paying back past due hospital bills and settling our debts that had occured durring her illness.
As of late January I thought I had repaid all debts and things were settled. Including the debts accrued at the one particular hospital of which this thread is the focus. You see when I called this hospital to repay any bills due I very explicitly asked the billing agent if there were ANY outstanding balances I should be made aware of regarding past due accounts and I was assured that there were not!
Fast forward to today and we find out that on 20 Feb 08, there has been a collection placed against my wife's credit report and after some investigation we find out it is an account turned over to collections from the hospital in question that my wife had been to a few times durring her course of treatment. So I called this hospital with my credit card statement in hand showing a charge to this hospital prepared to fully dispute this collection action. It turns out that my payment was on an account (they apparently make a new account each time a patient visits) other than this one that was quitely in collections with a balance due. All of this AFTER I specifically asked the rep back in January if there were any other charges, accounts, etc. I needed to be made aware of.....anything at all that could surprise me and I was VERY specific about this.
To sum it up, had I known this "other" account existed and was in collections at the time I was paying everything off in January, I could have and more importantly WOULD have taken care of it then before anything was posted on any credit reports. As it is, since the billing rep told me everything was square back in January AND I took their word for it, this collection action has now been posted on my wife's credit report.
When I asked the rep today how this could have happened they fed me a line about how this account was in collections prior to the day I called and how once an account goes to collections it shows up as inactive in their system...blah blah blah. To which I replied "but you clearly have visibility of all the accounts tied to this patient right now... yes??" And the answer from them was in fact yes but this is only because today I was asking them to specifically look into all the accounts active or not.
I then made it clear and explaied how I was asking for this EXACT same information the last time I called. Then they tried to argue with how they had sent letters and left phone messages and so on. To this I replied that regardless of how many letters went out or how many phone calls were left the fact remains that had I been given the correct information I was requesting in the first place when I tried to take care of things in January, this collection would not be on my wife's report today. Not to mention the fact that because this lady today was able to successfully give me all the information on all accounts related to my wife's hospital visits flat out PROOVES that it was very possible to give me this information the first time I called yet they still try to circle back around to their arguments of how they sent out letters and got no reply etc. etc.
The fact of the matter is that I DID reply on January 30th and in good faith attempted to resolve any and all unpaid bills including any collections actions. Furthermore I remember being very specific upon requesting information concerning any and all charges outstanding (including any collection actions)
Point blank - the people in this billing department failed me when I requested the information that could have enabled me to prevent all of this and now it feels like there is nothing left to do except suck it up and take it in the ass for 7 more years.
I'm a stand up guy who is fair dealing and I can accept that hey there was this account in collections and it was our responsibility to act in time to take care of it. What I can't accept is that when I tried to do the right thing I got set up for failure. I also typically hate those who try to play the victem but in this case I feel like I got f*cked because someone else failed to provide me with some very crucial information after I made a reasonable and honest attempt to collect said information.
There must be some kind of legal recourse I can take against these chuckleheads.
Suggestions from the legally savvy?
:|
-Thanks for listening (err... reading.)
Facebook
Twitter