ComplaintsforCommonwealth Emergency Physician
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Complaint Details
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Initial Complaint
10/31/2022
- Complaint Type:
- Product Issues
- Status:
- Answered
Reading through the complaints for this doctor's office, there are some serious ethical concerns here. I am writing on behalf of my mother who has received treatment similar to others here on BBB from this office. She is 70 years old, retired, and is on a fixed income. The complete disregard for her financial situation by the billing department of this doctor's office is astonishing. She was admitted for emergency care at ***** ******* Hospital on 11/30/21 with provider Dr. ***** *****. She has insurance with ****, which is supposed to fully cover her by both the hospital as well as this provider. She received a bill for this service on 4/1/22 for $1,218 stating that this is the "Final Notice" and that her account will "turned over to a collection agency" (standard intimidation tactics). This was the very first bill she received from this provider, but somehow it was the "Final Notice". Worried about the threat, we sent payment by check on 4/14/22 for the full amount. It was cashed by this doctor's office within six days. Later and after some investigation, we realized that they did not send in a claim to her insurance company. We called repeatedly and finally, they submitted the claim to her insurance. The Explanation of Benefits (EoB) from the insurance company shows a "member responsibility" of $1.25. Not $1,218. We called the provider again on 8/15/22 and explained. Finally and seemingly admitting to their mistake, they told us to email "*******************.com" with the EoB. They said she would receive a refund check in "30-45 days". That was two and a half months ago. We've received neither the refund nor any response whatsoever to the email. I've uploaded a copy of the check we paid with as well as the EoB showing that she was incorrectly charged. We request the doctor's office to contact us as soon as possible to properly reimburse her for the improper charge immediately.Business response
12/02/2022
We are sorry for the delay, this is the first notice that we are seeing. We will review the complaint and information and reply immediately.
Thank you,
Business response
12/13/2022
This was a compliant strictly related to the billing for this patient, not the medical services rendered. Here is the reply from the billing company, who process the patient billing for Commonwealth Emergency Physicians:
"We appreciate your patience as we have been looking into this. To answer a few concerns listed in the patients letter, it was mentioned that the first bill received was a final notice, but we found that a statement went out on 3/4/2022 and the final notice would have gone out at the beginning of April. The reason statements were sent out is because we were filing to the insurance the patient was registered as having, but we kept getting denied. We knew the patient had insurance so the statement was sent out to them as a courtesy to allow them to provide us with the correct insurance.
It looks like when the patient reached out to contact us about the bill, they simultaneously paid the bill in full ($1,218) and provided us with the correct insurance (GEHA-ASA). We received and posted the payment from the patient. We filed the claim to the correct insurance. Once we received payment from the insurance and posted it, a refund to the patient was set in process. We received the EOB in a delayed manner and this delayed the posting of the payment as well as setting up the refund to be issued. The insurance left the patient responsibility of $1.25, so the refund amount to the patient is $1,216.75. The refund has gone through today."
We will continue to follow up with the billing company until we can confirm that the refund check has been issued. The delay in getting the refund was due to incorrect insurance information which is not corrected and we apologize for the delay in getting the patient's refund.
Thank you,
Commonwealth Emergency Physicians
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Customer Complaints Summary
4 total complaints in the last 3 years.
3 complaints closed in the last 12 months.