[toadal racer]

I currently have a 15000 bill with the hspital for sugery and don't have work can I negotiate a dicount and payment plan with them

[tickle]

You should be asking them.

Tick

[excon]

Hello t:

Can you negotiate?? You can sure try... But, successful negotiations only happen when EACH party has something to gain...

Right now, you owe the money, and the hospital wants it TODAY. You're going to be asking the hospital to take less and wait... What's in it for them to agree?

Right now, they can SUE you, WIN, and EMPTY your bank accounts, and GARNISH your wages for the next 10 years until they get paid, and they'll get INTEREST too...

So, they have nothing to gain by agreeing to less and waiting...

However, if you want to get them excited about dealing with you, offer them CASH. If you can somehow get SOME cash, it would be my bet that you can cut your $15K debt down to around $5K.

excon

[morgaine300]

I think excon's getting a little extreme. Yes, technically you owe them the money. But there's a lot of however's.

First, an insurance company would probably never pay that full bill and therefore you have a legit argument to get it reduced right there, even if you can't do anything else. This is perfectly fair, ethical and moral... cause why should YOU have to carry the extra burden of paying a higher amount to make up for insurance companies and government programs that would never pay a full bill? Cause that's essentially what they're doing to you. That bill is what my brother would call "the sucker price." (If nothing else works out, call an attorney and at least see about knocking down the bill to a fair price. You can usually talk for free for a short time and it might be worth hiring someone. If you look under medical, you'll get the ambulance chasers, so you might try a bankruptcy lawyer since they're used to dealing with credit issues.)

Second, some hospitals do have programs to help you out. That will depend on the hospital, of course. Did you ask about a self pay discount? That should come off first. (They should be happy to do that, cause dealing with insurance is more difficult than dealing with you.)

Third, there are public programs to help with such things. Everyone claims the poor don't have health care. Bull! It's actually easier to get help when you have no job or have a really low income. The difficulty for this kind of help actually comes with people who make a little more, but too much to get the public help. (i.e. too much to have it paid, and not rich enough to pay it themselves)

What is available will depends on where you are.

Call the hospital and see if they have financial counselors and speak with one of them. Tell them the situation and see what they say. Don't be afraid to be a little pushy. And you certainly should be able to work out a payment plan.

I have to disagree that they want that money TODAY. They don't even bother sending bills out for two months, so I can't say as they seem to be in any hurry. They'll take forever to decide if you're approved, etc. In the meantime, yes, they might eventually turn you over to collections, but just call and remind them the ball's in their court. In fact, medical billing I'd have to say is contributing to high health costs. (Now imagine if the government did it.)

You also might get online and search for public programs. I just tried my state followed by "medical assistance" and that worked.

BTW, I'm a conservative and in no way any kind of bleeding heart, and yet I can still say all this with no guilt or shame. My biggest issue is that the 15,000 bill probably should be about 7000 to begin with. (And you can probably get it knocked way lower.)

(This entire post under the assumption we're in the U.S. Partly cause of the name "toadal" - oh, very funny. Partly cause, well, aren't we the only ones left without socialized medicine? LOL)

[morgaine300]

We can comment in the rep, but can't comment in the post? Huh? Sorry, don't get that concept. (And your greenie to me won't guilt me into not saying that, cause that's not fair.)