Amber Stubbs

Review of Radiology Associates of Macon,...

As a student who had recently changed jobs, I was ...

As a student who had recently changed jobs, I was at a point where I did not have health insurance. Had an accident and fractured one of the vertebra in my neck. Between the initial emergency room fees and all of the follow up appointments with a specialist while uninsured, I drained my emergency funds. After about a month or two, all the different medical bills for my hospital visit started coming in. There was no way I could afford them, and every different department that entertained the idea of making payments would not settle for small amounts every month, so I could not go that route either. I ended up contacting the coliseum and applied for financial assistance. I mailed off all of my pay stubs for the year, and had to send them all of my banking information and invoices from previous months. This shows them EVERYTHING, which means you cannot hide anything in regards to how much money you have to your name. The assistance place saw that my accounts had pretty much been bled dry at that point, and covered everything I still had left to pay on my invoice. Never been so relieved. Basically, they send a letter saying your account was taken care of and closed out. I even requested additional proof with an invoice for everything paid, so it is all listed, with the coded items, and a $0.00 balance to the right. Every. Single. Company. I called who I owed money to, accepted this, I mailed them a copy, and they made sure to close everything out so I would not keep getting bills in the mail. Radiology Associates had CLAIMED that they honored this when I told them I was waiting on approval (also, they did not want to wait for the approval, and wanted my to start making monthly payments in the meantime.... but the reason I was applying for aid was because I didn't have the money..). I mailed Rad Associates of Macon the letter saying my debt was wiped. First of all, it took them over a month to "get the letter into their system". Meanwhile, they harassed me with letters in the mail, even though I was calling every week to check on my letter's status. FINALLY they processed the letter and WOULD NOT ACCEPT IT. The code and invoice numbers on the letter I sent them were exactly the same as what they were billing me for, and even though it showed the item, initial charge, and a new charge of $0.00, the woman one the phone said that wasn't good enough. She sounded very upset on the phone, and told me since the letter from the financial assistance place didn't say the PERCENTAGE covered, it was against their policy to accept it. As in, the letter said my new charges were $0, but since it did not say *100%* was covered, it wasn't good enough. I told her that if the initial charges were $700-something dollars, and the new charge is $0, that means it was 100% covered (the math is quite complicated, I know.) I asked her to double check, she claimed to check with someone else, and still would not accept this letter. I asked what she wanted me to do, because I had laid everything out to the assistance place, and didn't have to money. I then asked if I could call the assistance place and get a new letter with 100% written on it, if that would work. She said yes, and to send it to them when I got it. I called the assistance place, told them the situation, and they agreed to send me a new letter. WELP, Radiology Associates of Macon wend ahead and sold my account to collections. Awesome job. They basically wanted to get me off the phone, so they could turn me over. Ended up having to work out payments with collections (which are lower than the minimum Radiology Associates of Macon were willing to take.) I think the way they handled the situation was ridiculous, and they should have just told me from the start that they did not honor financial assistance programs, instead of lying and saying they did. No other billing departments gave me trouble like them. They even made sure to tack on some late charges while waiting on the whole assistance situation to go through, which was really nice.
UPDATE:Said they would refund me, & never did. 0 stars.