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My son is a diabetic and in the past three years has had to be admitted to the hospital three times. He was covered under insurance for one admit but not for the other two. He was laid off of two jobs during this time. He is working now but barely makes enough to make rent, utilities and medical supplies. He is being hounded by collection agencies. He became overwhelmed by all of the bills and fell into the "ignore them" rut. He now realizes that he cannot run from these bills. He is confused by the number of the bills, all of the different agencies and the amount. Total is around $20,000. He is scared to death of having wages garnished as he will not be able to pay for his medical supplies (insulin pump) and a place to live. Moving in with Mom and Dad is not an option as we live in different towns. So much time has passed that the collection agencies are not wanting to work with him now and they are demanding full payment or else. Is there a business that he can contact that he can take all of his bills to and they can seperate them out? What original creditor goes with what collection agency? Also, two of the collection agencies actually have different names. They send two letters out each month from each place for the same bill. Taking out a loan is out of the question as 1-he cannot afford any type of extra payment each month and 2-his credit is ruined and would not qualify for a loan. Asking family for money is not an option either as we are still raising two younger children and barely making ourselves. One of his bills is for a volunteer ambulance service for a wreck that he was involved in with three other people. The ambulance was called for the other people but my son was not hurt and signed a AMA form stating he didn't want any treatment. The ambulance sent the charge into collections. Can they do that? Also, each time he was admitted to the hospital, the ER doctors admitted him to Intensive Care even though he and myself requested he not go to intensive care. He has been admitted before for the same medical reason and been admitted under general care. We told them when he was admitted to intensive care that he did not have insurance and did not have any means to pay. The bills kept coming and by the time he called to see if the hospital had any kind of financial services, they told him they couldn't help because the bills had gone to collections so he had to pay it. Any advice would be appreciated.
Last edited by magoomafoo; 03-01-2011 at 10:05 PM..
Reason: adding
Check to see if he is covered under Medicaid. I'm not expert, but, they sometimes make the coverage retroactive if he was eligible and that would help the bills. Diabetes is very costly and needs to be monitored all the time. His health is the number one priority and if he can get over this hump hopefully he can get things sorted out.
You should have dealt with this a long time back, by now your son could have been a different individual. A responsible person will never let the bills get out of reach. Aptor hours has a good suggestion for you. Also remember, that if your son gets sued under adverse circumstances, ask him not to ignore it any more. Let him be there (on the specified date), and plead to the court.
well if he is only 20 and in debt then I assume he has no assets. In that case just file bankruptcy. Don't feel bad about the banks, they could careless if you end up homeless on the streets. It'll be difficult to get credit in the future but then again thats a good thing (if you ask me, since debt = scam). When you can't get credit, its a great motivator to actually save up and pay cash. That'll save you boatloads in interest.
funny comic, but truer than ever. All those people with debt are paying dearly with their monthly interest payments.
Check to see if he is covered under Medicaid. I'm not expert, but, they sometimes make the coverage retroactive if he was eligible and that would help the bills. Diabetes is very costly and needs to be monitored all the time. His health is the number one priority and if he can get over this hump hopefully he can get things sorted out.
He doesn't qualify for medicaid-besides, they only go back 3 months, not two years
well if he is only 20 and in debt then I assume he has no assets. In that case just file bankruptcy. Don't feel bad about the banks, they could careless if you end up homeless on the streets. It'll be difficult to get credit in the future but then again thats a good thing (if you ask me, since debt = scam). When you can't get credit, its a great motivator to actually save up and pay cash. That'll save you boatloads in interest.
funny comic, but truer than ever. All those people with debt are paying dearly with their monthly interest payments.
Every single one of his bills are medical. He does not have a loan, has a credit card that he does not use and does not owe any banks. He pays cash for everything. It's a little hard to stomach his debt when the main cause of it is not something he could avoid such as racking up credit card debt or taking out loans. Had he not gone to the hospital, he would've died. I am having a hard time with the fact he is only 20 and looking at bankruptcy. There has to be some other way.
Really - if he doesn't have the money to pay these bills - there isn't any other way.
90% of the companies that talk about "debt settlement" are a scam, and besides - they work on the premise that you can pay them some money. If he has no money - they won't take him.
The better companies - CCC (consumer credit counselors) are non-profit but I don't know that the work with medical debt/collection agencies. They generally work with Credit Card companies.
Collection agencies make pure profit and will continue to hound your son forever. They bought his debt for pennies on the dollar and every cent he gives them will go towards their bottom line - they have no incentive to stop harassing him and will probably eventually take him to court where most likely a judge will order his wages garnished.
He may be able to fight the ambulance charges - but he'd have to prove that he didn't call them and had nothing to do with their arrival on the scene. If you call an ambulance to your house and then decide not to go - you still owe the ambulance money for showing up.
Same with the hospital - it really doesn't matter that you said "No ICU" - that's where they put him that's where the charge is.
Keep in mind - once the hospital sells the debt to a collector - the hospitals have no control over that debt anymore. Even if someone at the hospital agreed with you, there's nothing they can do. They sold the collector a contract giving the collector a legal right to collect the money from your son. They won't go back to the collector now and say "we were wrong, its only 10,000 - not 20,000". No way.
At 20 - if he files bankruptcy, he'll be out of it by 27. Plus it would give him the breathing room necessary to get ahead in his life.
I'm sorry - but medical bankruptcy is becoming more and more common. The main thing is once these bills are taken care of, does he have some sort of medical insurance (medicaid) is fine to prevent this from happening again?? Otherwise, he'll be right back in hot water.
I would find a lawyer who's adept at medical bankruptcies (usually they can adjust their fees or work out a reasonable plan) and start there.
The only real other option is cut his monthly expenses dramatically so he has some money to work with to pay the bill (i.e. move back in with you, etc..). But you say that won't work.
Or -- get a better job making considerably more money, or get a 2nd/3rd job to make a lot more money - so that he has money to pay these bills. But it doesn't sound like you think that can happen.
When there's no way to make more money, and there's no way to cut expenses and you can't afford the bills you have (no matter how those bills will incurred) - that's the whole point of bankruptcy.
Good luck to your son. Hope he's able to stay healthy.
I don't know your son's situation, but I do know you can work with doctors and hospitals and make interest free payments.
I have several doctor bills and they allow me to make interest free monthly payments. I'm just about to make the final payment to one doctor. The total bill for him was just over $3K. I told them I didn't have the money, so they told me to pay $100 a month. I have been paying them a little over a $100 and now have the bill down to a couple of hundred by making payments every month. They aren't a lon company, so they don't charge interest, they are happy to carry you as long as you make steady payments..!
I had several doctor bills and a couple of hospital bills that I paid of in that manner, never paying a cent of interest.
If you let it go to collection, you are probably going to get charged interest and get harrassed. You should have made arrangments to pay them a little at a time and it wouldn't have cost any interest. If you just ignore the bills, then they get nasty.. Go talk to the people you owe money too, if it isn't too late, and never let getting behind be an excuse for stop paying.
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