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Bankruptcy as a debt management solution: Why do so many of us have so much debt?
In 2004, 1,562,174 Americans sought protection from creditors through bankruptcy court - a per capita rate over ten times higher than during the worst years of the Great Depression! According to the Consumer Federation of America, in 2003 alone over...
Get out of Debt - Top 5 Reasons you need to Consolidate Loans
GET OUT OF DEBT - TOP FIVE REASONS YOU NEED TO CONSOLIDATE LOANS Today, the number of people filing for bankruptcy has skyrocketed by 44% in just the past 10 years with numbers continuing to climb. Consumer credit has reached an all-time high,...
Pay Down Your Debt Now. Don't Wait For The Perfect Situation.
The number one reason people don’t get out of debt is they don’t try. This may apply to you. You want to, but never seem to do it. You put it off for whatever reason. Sometimes, you want to wait for your life to be just right before you...
Settle your debts the easy way
The process of contacting creditors directly or through a third party and negotiating for a lump sum payoff of your debts is known as debt settlement .
Benefits of debt settlement
* You can reduce your principal debt amount by around 40%...
The New Bankruptcy Law -- How Will It Affect Debt Negotiation?
In April 2005, Congress made sweeping changes in U.S. bankruptcy law that will go into effect on October 17, 2005. It's called the "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005," and it means big trouble for Americans struggling...
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Medical Collections True Tale: A Dental Debt Deadbeat
Medical collections are costing doctors millions. Here are the secrets of why patients don’t always pay their bills, from a real-life deadbeat.
With medical collections costing doctors millions upon millions of dollars in unpaid bills and collection fees, many people have just one question: Who are these people who are trying to stiff the doctors who delivered them from great physical pain (or the flu, hypochondria, not-so-white-teeth, or a nose that didn’t look enough like Brad Pitt’s)?
Well, I’m here to tell you who these people are, or at least some of them.
They’re me.
Yes, I admit it: I left a dentist’s bill unpaid for three months.
OK, so dentistry isn’t technically considered “medical,” but it’s the same situation: a doctor left in the lurch.
Why did I do such a horrible thing, especially when I, a small businessperson myself, know how difficult unpaid debts can make cash flow, and how it could very easily make me persona non grata in that office?
Why Medical Collections Happen
Or, Possible Reasons for Me Being a Deadbeat
Here are reasons commonly advanced for why people like me might not pay a doctor’s bill.
1. They don’t have enough money, plain and simple. After all, if they couldn’t afford insurance, they probably are going to have trouble with the bill.
2. They don’t care about the poor doctors and either don’t know about or don’t care about the potential for damage to their own credit ratings.
3. They are chronically lazy, stupid, or just don’t know what they’re doing. OK, the terms used aren’t quite that specific, but that’s the general idea.
All of these possible reasons why a patient might not pay could be pretty discouraging for a practice looking to get the money it’s owed. After all, there’s not much even the best doctor can do about a patient’s poverty, venality, or fecklessness.
But is there really so little hope for collecting on medical debt?
Why Medical Collection Isn’t Necessarily So Hopeless
Or, The Real Reason I Didn’t Pay My Dentist’s Bill
I just signed and mailed a check for my outstanding dentist’s bill. That just goes to show the situation isn’t so hopeless after all, doesn’t it? Here’s at least one case of a healthcare practice getting its money back., and after three months at that
No, my financial situation did not improve dramatically, nor did
my slothful ways correct themselves.
Wondering what the dentist did to make me pay? Plead? Cajole? Shame? Threaten to put the tartar back?
Actually, the dentist didn’t do anything, and that’s the problem.
Here’s what happened: I remembered I had the bill to pay.
I had forgotten ever owing the dentist money. Since I wasn’t expecting the dentist’s bill, unlike all the bills that come every month, it got lost in a pile of credit card offers, appeals to help save trees being cut down to make paper, and news about really great products for writers. The follow-up letter reminding me to pay met a similar fate. It probably didn’t help when I took a trip to Las Vegas and then threw away the junk mail en masse when I got back.
I finally remembered the bill when someone asked me to write an article about medical collections. Sure enough, the follow-up letter (though not the original bill) was there in the pile of newsletters and friendly reminders from various businesses to schedule this or that appointment.
The Moral of the Story
If you are a patient, make sure to check your mail for letters from the doctor’s office. If you’re running a healthcare practice, follow up with your patients who have outstanding invoices—a phone call is preferable, since it’s less likely to get lost at the bottom of a pile of correspondence.
Don’t have time for that? Worried about the legal issues of collection law compliance? Don’t let that stop you. Go to a company that specializes in medical collections and accounts receivables management for healthcare practices.
It’s not about "putting debts in collection" anymore. Many of these companies offer everything from sending out a few polite phone calls and letters to end-to-end accounts receivable management. None of this has to impact your patients’ credit rating or cost you a fortune.
Your office can go back to healing people. Isn’t that why you got into this business in the first place?
About the Author
Read more of Joel Walsh's articles on debt collection: http://www.let-no-debt-remain-outstanding.com/debt-collection-agency-articles.html [Publish this article on your website! Requirement: live link for above URL/web address w/ link text/anchor text: "debt collection" OR leave this bracketed message intact.]
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