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Gaffer Variety:
Fools and Thugs 046:
By Willie Gaffer:
Jun 26, 2006:
It never seems to end. We continuously encounter fools and
thugs in our daily doings. As always, I am ready to tell the world
about them. I will keep blasting them on this website as long
as they continue to muck around in my life with their incompetent
clerks and thugs. This particular case happened because of some
incompetent clerks at Quest Diagnostics. They screwed up an insurance
claim then tried to extort money from me to cover their loss.
I responded with this letter. I have used the phrasing so often
this is becoming almost a form letter.
Director
Quest Diagnostics
P O Box 740020
Cincinnati, OH 45274-0020
Copies
Quest Diagnostics Billing Dept., Auburn Hills, MI.
File.
A person of acquaintance:
Reference invoice number 3741842473.
Dear Person:
Please do not ignore or discard this letter. This is an official complaint against Quest Diagnostics and is the only one you will receive.
I am beyond angry with the behavior of your staff in Auburn
Hills, MI. Your people have bungled your billing, blamed me for
it, and made vile threats and coercive attempts to extort money
from me.
That is completely unacceptable.
The facts in this situation are simple:
Someone on your staff filed an improper claim against Medicare
for a service you claim to have performed on November 29, 2005.
The person entered an incorrect Social Security (SS) number on
the claim. In fact she transposed 2 characters on the number.
Instead of entering my SS number which is XYZ-**-**** she entered
XZY-**-****.
This is particularly ridiculous since you obviously have my SS
number in your computer. Instead of typing it incorrectly, she
could have copied and pasted it correctly. Regardless, at that
time a simple review of the form could have corrected the error.
That was your first chance to avoid this nonsense.
Of course, Medicare properly rejected the claim. At that time, you and I were both sent a copy of the rejection (copy enclosed) which clearly showed the reason for the rejection. At that time, a cursory look at the Medicare form would have revealed your error. That was your second chance to avoid this stupidity.
Instead, you chose to dun me for money I did not owe to you. When we received your erroneous dun my wife returned it to you with a careful explanation of what was wrong. That was your third chance to correct your bungling. Instead you chose to ignore our response.
In addition to that, you could have noticed that Medicare paid for the same service a month before and a month after the claim your people bungled. In fact, Medicare has been paying those same claims for many months. You did not notice that. That was, in fact, your fourth chance to correct yourself, but you did not.
Now I have received another vile threatening dun (copy enclosed)
from you with an explicit threat to sic your thug bill collectors
on me and do irrevocable harm to my credit.
That is beyond the pale.
The theme through all of this has been one of failure on the part of your people in proper procedure. Reviewing the facts, it is difficult for me to see how all of it could be simply the result of mistakes on your part. Certainly the failure of your staff to take appropriate action when Medicare showed you were clearly in the wrong indicates malicious intent. Whether there was intent or simply incredible incompetence and indolence is really irrelevant to my wife and me. The mental anguish and sleepless nights we suffered because of this would have been the same. We are not young people who like to handle stress as some kind of a game. These things take a huge toll on us.
Now I want an end to this. I will expect an apology within three weeks of the date of this letter (May 11, 2006). I do not want a telephone response. Our experience indicates that the verbal promises of people like you and your staff are unreliable. I want a written apology under your letterhead above your signature. Anything less will be unacceptable.
If you fail to take proper action and continue to harass me I will very definitely seek legal remedies against you. If I am going to suffer additional stress from your bad behavior I will secure redress.
Willie gaffer:
I will carry on with this theme when and if I receive a response
from these idiots. In this case, depending on their stance, I
may very well engage an attorney. I m really quite sick of these
stupidly managed outfits with their minimum wage bunglers.
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