Children's may provide great care, but their billi...

Children's may provide great care, but their billing practices are predatory, unethical, and probably borderline illegal. I am being charged almost $400 for a single x-ray at their urgent care center across town. The head of the billing office literally told me she didn't know how insurance worked and then after I explained it to her, she said, "You should be paying more [than someone with insurance] because you aren't paying the insurance company.

I filed a complaint with Patient Relations, but the patient relations office run by Kristin is a joke. Their solution was to "ask my pediatrician to pay the bill for me." What!? Seriously!? Ironically, most places want everything in writing, but Childrens actually refuses to put complaints or their resolution in writing. They send out form letters that say essentially, "we reviewed your complaint and called you with the resolution." But Kristin's story changed at least three time in one conversation so who knows what the "official" resolution was or if there even was one. I asked that the complaint be escalated and that Kristin's incompetence be reviewed. I was never contacted and eventually received an email that basically said, we talked to Kristin and she thinks she's doing a great job. There were no details of the complaint and therefore no real resolution.

Nearly everyone who has actually had to pay Children's hospital for services has similar stories of their wildly inflated prices and complete unwillingness to work with anyone or even act like decent human beings.

Update: I saw the response below and wanted to follow up. Patient relations repeatedly told me on the phone that this was my pediatrician's fault and she needed to fix it. They gave a variety of non-sensical explanations of why and what she was supposed to do about it. She has no affiliation with Childrens at all. The letter they sent said their prices were justified because they are based on ER pricing even though this is an urgent care center. Not sure how I was supposed to get one from the other, but that's Childrens I guess.