Using plastic to pay Anthem bill? Prepare to lose your coverage

[Liberal_in_LA]

Using plastic to pay Anthem bill? Prepare to lose your coverage
Notice of cancellation was a shock to one policyholder who had been making automatic payments with her credit card. It's just one case involving a policy switch at the health insurer.

Andrea Kreuzhage is the kind of customer all health insurers dream of having. She's in excellent shape, never submits medical claims and pays all her bills on time.

So, of course, Anthem Blue Cross canceled her coverage last week.

This is the latest twist in Anthem's decision to no longer allow members to make automatic payments with credit cards. As Kreuzhage's case illustrates, it may not be a smooth transition for many people.

She was told by the company that she was joining the ranks of the uninsured because she didn't pay her bill.

"This occurred either because Blue Cross did not receive your premium within 31 days of the premium due date, or because we did not receive sufficient funds to cover your premium," Kreuzhage, 48, was informed by letter.

"I was shivering when I read this," the Baldwin Hills documentary filmmaker told me. "I had done everything right. I had never missed a payment. And yet now I had no health insurance for the first time in my life. It felt like doomsday."

It wasn't doomsday. It was just an example of a major corporation turning the screws on a customer to get what it wanted.

In this case, what it wanted was access to Kreuzhage's checking account, rather than her credit card account.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lazarus-20110920,0,2211923.column

[Bozita]

1. Three words for the folks at Anthem...

[Earth_First]

2. ...and Washington does: NOTHING!!! n/t

[Liberal_in_LA]

3. California govt is monitoring the situation

[Earth_First]

4. I really hope so!

The ever increasing shell game that the corporations have accelerated in order to fleece the consumer is mind-bending...

How much longer can this continue?

[elleng]

5. Because 'Washington' knows everything AND IS ABLE TO FIX EVERYTHING, right?

:thumbsdown:

[Lasher]

6. Man that's some sinister shit.

So I guess if there's a charge you don't agree with they take your money anyway?

[Liberal_in_LA]

8. They'll continue to take credit card payments for $15 fee each mo, requires phone call to rep.

Speculation is they want to make it easier for someone to miss a payment with this additional hurdle.

[marmar]

7. Our "health care" system is criminal.

nt

[dixiegrrrrl]

9. why didn't the woman just sit down and write a check every month?

Did I miss something?

Lots of "services" now charging "convenience fees" to accept plastic.
Our cell phone, AT&T, charges 5.00 if we pay by plastic.
So does Frontier phone company, do did DISH when we had tv.
So does Power Company.
NO way in hell will I sign up for automatic bill pay from my checking account tho.

[Yo_Mama]

11. Mail isn't reliable

I have a lot of problems with bills paid by mail, and so I try to either pay one month ahead or pay electronically.

If your check doesn't get to the company, they cancel you just like Anthem did.

[Obamanaut]

18. But I've read numerous posts here about how great USPS is, and it should

be kept no matter what.

[Kali]

12. except for the last decade they have been trying to get everybody to pay WITH plastic

it is all about fucking the "customer" for fees and extra charges

assholes

[RebelOne]

15. I pay all my bills with my debit card or automatic deduction

and have never been charged any extra fees.

[tblue37]

16. With the amount of pressure people are under, scrambling at increasingly

high-pressure jobs to keep food on the table, often working more than one job, and with the complexity of modern life in general and the constant demands for our time and attention, it is all too easy to let something slip. With health insurance, the slightest slip-up can cause you to be dropped from your plan--and once that happens, it is usually impossible to get insured again, period.

Having your premiums paid automatically like that is intended precisely to make sure that one does not get distracted one time and make such a major boo-boo.

[Chan790]

19. oh oh oh , they don't want a check either.

They charge convenience fees for "check-handling" too. They want your only option to be automatic clearing house (ACH) checking account debiting...the reason has nothing to do with credit or debit cards honestly. If you set up an automatic checking account debit, they have no obligation to stop the charges as long as they are providing the agreed upon service, even if you request that they stop charging you and end your service. (They have to provide a procedure legally so they wrote one that is unfulfillable...my favorite was the one that required you to mail them back a notarized copy of a form requesting in writing that they cancel your service...a form they readily admitted didn't exist.) They just keep charging you and providing you with "services". It's equally impossible to get the charges reversed...it's a scam. They're not the only ones doing it either...credit monitoring services, student loan administrators and a number of other providers of non-tangible services do this as well.

I used to deal with clients at the bank that ended up having to close their accounts to stop these sorts of ACH automated debits...they should be illegal or very highly-regulated, but we can't get any regulation over them passed, even with the massive weight of the banking lobby.

[Yo_Mama]

20. I don't mean to keep harping on it

But this sort of crap is exactly why so many people hate the idea of Obamacare so much.

Being forced to buy insurance from some such company isn't going to make the insurance co less arrogant, less unresponsive and less willing to gouge the public, is it?

And don't tell me about regulation. These companies are already regulated, and they get away with this sort of crap.

Not everyone HAS a bank account, and everyone who does would be wise to limit ACHs.

[dixiegrrrrl]

21. You have just confirmed for me why I do not ever want to have ACH.

all this insistence on taking control of people's money "for them" "for your convenience".
I have learned to run away!!! run away!!!!! every time I hear "for your convenience".

Having said that, I admit I just signed up for direct deposit of my Soc. Sec. checks, reluctantly.
And, in the process, was told that come 2013, anyone who gets checks and who is not signed up for direct deposit will be issued one of those plastic debit cards. Which DO have hidden fees.
Money is becoming obsolete, have you noticed?

[sarcasmo]

10. For profit health care only helps the stock holders.

[Skittles]

13. more chance of late fees / cancellations with non-auto payments

[NICO9000]

14. Time for the CA AG to sue

And a class action as well. How on earth can a giant company like Anthem decide they don't want to take credit cards anymore? The fucking deli down the block takes 'em and it probably costs them a lot more in fees to process them than a huge corporation that seems to exist only to fuck their customers over? There is no way they should be allowed to pull this shit. Despicable, but predictable behavior as usual.

:mad:
x 1 kajillion

[pa28]

17. No mystery why we don't have a public option.

Health insurance as an industry would quickly be forced to improve or become a thing of the past.

[JoeyT]

22. If you pay automatically it prevents you from ever making the late payment

that they'll use as an excuse when they cancel your insurance the first time you get sick.