What can they do for unpaid medical bills?

[blackangst1]

I'd go ahead and mail them a check for $10 a month, no matter what they say. Make certain to keep canceled checks (or, if your bank is like mine, and puts the scanned check on their website, print out the cashed check). So long as you're making an attempt to pay it off, you're better off than if you're ignoring it.

Suggest you read the bottom part of this page, the section marked "Credit Health Checkup".

Better off, yes. But sending $10/mo doesnt remove the option of the original creditor sending it to collections. There's an urban myth that if you send them something that ties their hands legally. It doesnt. If, after 10 months and paying net $100 towards a $1500 bill, the hospital or whatever decides enough is enough, they can demand payment in full or send to collection agency. All the $10/mo payments did is lower your balance that gets sent.

 

[brblx]

Compared to stopping all payment on your credit card bills like you've been talking about, yes the effect is small. Compared to what all of us normal people think, the effect can be relatively large.

it really isn't. i owed (might still- don't care) a hospital like five grand for a procedure that insurance denied despite preapproval. also the combo of moron doctor and fraudulent insurance company (fwiw it appears united healthcare's business model is based on the fictional 'great benefit' from 'the rainmaker') caused some issues...like a routine office visit or follow-up appt being flagged as 'preexisting condition' and not paid.

so i actually have multiple bills from multiple places. the big one, they finally appeared to give up on. either that or it was nullified by one of the newer healthcare laws.

my credit WAS like a 750, even with these issues. good enough to finance a new car at 0% while i still owed 90% on my previous one.

why did i still owe so much? it was totaled. my insurance co (geico) paid out pretty quickly (happened right after i bought the other new car, couple weeks maybe)...but i had to fight with the idiots that i had gap insurance through. obviously i did not want to make possible payments while i was waiting on the gap people to figure their part.



so, anyway, long story short- ~15k car, paid off 12k within a year, then did not pay for two months while i waited for the gap insurance co (allstate for the record- 'good hands' my ass) to pay. ended up only owing a couple hundred bucks.

that two months of nonpayment following a 12k payment on the principal did a shitload more damage to my credit than years of unpaid medical bills have. i'd say that's a pretty significant difference.

 

[boomhower]

That and many hospitals now offer a cash discount. You have to ask for it but many will lowwer the bill sometimes to the same price they charge insurance.

Actually it's the other way around here. We had some dates screwed up on my wifes insurance when we took our daughter for a check-up. Ended up she wasn't insured at the time, bill was $1200. Called and told them what was going on, "Oh, ok. That's our insurance price. Your will be $700." Yeah, the system needs fixing. Everyone wants a piece of the pie and it's gotten to be a damn big pie.

 

[BoomerD]

Actually it's the other way around here. We had some dates screwed up on my wifes insurance when we took our daughter for a check-up. Ended up she wasn't insured at the time, bill was $1200. Called and told them what was going on, "Oh, ok. That's our insurance price. Your will be $700." Yeah, the system needs fixing. Everyone wants a piece of the pie and it's gotten to be a damn big pie.

That's what they bill the insurance...but, especially if they're part of the PPO, they accept a MUCH smaller payment from the insurance company.
My doctor is the same way...office visit is $55 in cash...and $80 if it's billed to the insurance...but the insurance only actually pays ~$32.50. The balance is written off per the PPO agreement.

 

[mattpegher]

it really isn't. i owed (might still- don't care) a hospital like five grand for a procedure that insurance denied despite preapproval. also the combo of moron doctor and fraudulent insurance company (fwiw it appears united healthcare's business model is based on the fictional 'great benefit' from 'the rainmaker') caused some issues...like a routine office visit or follow-up appt being flagged as 'preexisting condition' and not paid.

so i actually have multiple bills from multiple places. the big one, they finally appeared to give up on. either that or it was nullified by one of the newer healthcare laws.

my credit WAS like a 750, even with these issues. good enough to finance a new car at 0% while i still owed 90% on my previous one.

why did i still owe so much? it was totaled. my insurance co (geico) paid out pretty quickly (happened right after i bought the other new car, couple weeks maybe)...but i had to fight with the idiots that i had gap insurance through. obviously i did not want to make possible payments while i was waiting on the gap people to figure their part.



so, anyway, long story short- ~15k car, paid off 12k within a year, then did not pay for two months while i waited for the gap insurance co (allstate for the record- 'good hands' my ass) to pay. ended up only owing a couple hundred bucks.

that two months of nonpayment following a 12k payment on the principal did a shitload more damage to my credit than years of unpaid medical bills have. i'd say that's a pretty significant difference.

Sounds like the hospital and or doctors chose to write off the balance and not send you to collections, if they had the effect on your credit would have been the same. Medical providers donot have the direct link to the credit bureaus that financial institutions do, but the collection agencies do. I wouldnt count on what is essentially the good will of the hospital, to write off the bill.

 

[brblx]

to be honest i don't remember if it made it to collections or not. the big bill, that is. they may have just finally haggled it out with the insurance company because they knew i was a lost cause. kind of like how i couldn't get my gap claim payed, yet less than a week after filing a BBB complaint against nissan, they got together with the finance company and the dealer to get allstate to friggin' pay up.

there's another bill for like ~700 for god knows what and i think one for ~120 for an office visit (just talked to doc- no tests) that i already payed the copay for (and had never had to pay more than that before). those went to collections. again, did not seem to have major effect. even though an auto loan and a hospital bill might end up at the same place, i don't think they get treated the same. perhaps somewhere, at some point in time, there was actually an intelligent person who said 'you know...i bet someone's loans, credit cards, ect are a lot more valid indicator of someone's financial reliability than whether or not they paid a ridiculous hospital bill that came about when they tried to not die.

 

[sixone]

I would just pay what you can. Worst case scenario is it gets sent to collections. It may end up on your credit report; however, reporting medical debt on a bureau is most often a HPPA violation and can usually get it removed (Google HPPA dispute for more info). That said, you still owe the money.

It's HIPAA, not HPPA or HIPPA.

 

[blackangst1]

It's HIPAA, not HPPA or HIPPA.

yah that