Medical bait and
switch
I’m beginning to believe
that some private enterprises think they’re the government. Their arrogance
gives them away.
If a large medical clinic
treats customers as though they were taxpayers in for an audit, I shudder
to think of what it might be like if we ever get national health care.
Airline pilots have to get
a thorough medical examination twice a year. Older pilots require an EKG—and
electrocardiogram—once a year as part of the exam.
There are three grades of
FAA medicals. Private pilots get a cursory check to see if their hearts
beat and their eyes and ears work. I think my first medical 25 years ago
cost about $25.
Commercial pilots are poked
and prodded more thoroughly, and the costs are a bit higher.
Airline pilots, especially
old ones, are checked even more closely for signs of defects.
My semi-annual medical exams
cost about $100 these days. Once a year I get an EKG to make sure my heart
still works right. That’s an extra $30 or so, but I never paid close attention
to which parts of the exam cost what.
Not his year, though:
Dear Medical Clinic Billing Department:
This protest goes back
to my bill dated Feb. 12, and the charges of Jan. 21.
I paid for my FAA First
Class Medical by credit card at the time of service as I always do. The
amount charged and paid—$128—was the customary charge for that service,
including the usual $30 for my annual electrocardiogram.
You might imagine my
shock at the additional $202 tacked on to the $30 EKG charge on my Feb.
12——a 773% increase.
I didn’t have time to
wait through your phone system’s “your call is important to us,” so I called
my local clinic’s billing department to point out what I assumed to be
an error. The clerk was baffled and said she’d investigate.
A letter from the local
clinic (copy enclosed) advised me that “we have adjusted $142 from this
account...as a patient courtesy to reflect a more graduated price increase.”
How nice. How courteous——a mere 300% increase, not 773%.
The problem, according
to the letter, is that you suddenly discovered you have been undercharging
for EKGs, apparently since the dawn of medical science. It appeared from
my bill that you were trying to recoup years of undercharges over the span
of a couple of weeks.
No one I know pays $232
for an EKG. I haven’t yet found anyone who pays even as much as $90.
My position is this:
You can charge whatever
you want for any service you provide, but anytime you jack up the price
of any service by 773%, or even by 300%, you owe it to your clients to
warn them ahead of time. What you do not do is go back later demanding
more money for a bill already presented and paid.
If I filled my gas tank,
paid the $30 bill, and went home, and then the oil company sent me a bill
for an additional $232, or even an additional $90—or even an additional
dime—because they’d discovered their gasoline “has been grossly under priced
for many years,” (to quote from your letter)...well, I’ll leave it to your
imagination as to what I might reply to that oil company in face of such
a ludicrous demand.
Your failure to properly
charge for your services “for many years” is your problem, not mine. Take
it out of your accountants’ hides, not mine.
I consider my bill for
my FAA medical exam and EKG to be paid in full with the clinic’s acceptance
of my payment made at the time of service for the reasonable, usual, and
customary amount charged at that time——$128.
In the future, I’ll ask
for an estimate of charges when I make any medical appointment, just as
I would if I were taking my car in for a tune-up.
Most sincerely,
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