Category: Insurance

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I’m a bit Bah Humbug today

Not that I didn’t have a great time with shopping for the past two days.

I had a totally great time and ton of laughs, plus a ton of walking. All of which are very good for my state of mind.

IMG 1070However, I’m dealing with car issues. My baby is at the dealership needing about $1500 in repair (Thank you California Freeways and Semi Trucks who insist on running on retreads that leave debris allover the roads) It really is time for a superfund that truck drivers MUST pay into so that the damage they cause can be paid for. 

That Superfund could  be used as incentive for all the truck drivers to operate their multi-ton instruments of destruction more safely.

That being said, the dealership has all the proper parts in stock and if I was paying for the repair, instead of the insurance company, I’d have my car back by late this afternoon.

Since the insurance company is paying for it, they’re insisting that an adjuster inspect the car adding 3 to 5 days to the whole process.

Including rental car fees and general inconvenience to all concerned. For that piddly sum, why bother? The car is at an authorized repair facility, specific to the vehicle. The Insurance company themselves prefers OEM parts. So it should be a no brainer. Alas… It’s not!

But that’s the way they want to waste their money, fine with me! Unfortunately they’re wasting ALL our money in the process.

Since I was dealing with insurance companies I figured, “I’ll deal with health care Insurance.”

What could possibly go wrong? 

LOL!

I was quoted $795.00 per month for high deductible medical Insurance with no dental or vision. Say what?

That’s more than my car payment and as much as my mortgage payment.

ARE YOU SHITTING ME?

One month of health insurance would cost me more than 1 year of the cost of my single medication for which I’m paying cash, out of pocket right now.

Uhhh NO! This speaks to a system that is so horribly broken I can’t even begin to describe it. While the Doctors and Hospitals are partially to blame. I contend that ultimately the fault for outrageous health care costs, lies squarely with the Insurance companies themselves. 

These are the same organizations that came into existence to help you plan for the worst. They were supposed to be, “you pay a little monthly so that you don’t have to cough up a huge chunk of cash IF something bad happens,” 

Clearly these companies are not what they once were and I contend that these companies should be thoroughly investigated and perhaps stripped of their business licenses. I’m stopping short of having their entire executive staffs whipped naked through the streets of every city in America.

That being said, they should be forced to return their huge profits to the individuals they STOLE from or their heirs.

I have wondered and continue to wonder what would happen if every single person in America simply refused to pay these excessively high, no, usury rates. This is no longer providing a service, this is flat out extortion. 

It’s time for our wonderful Congress to apply racketeering laws to the Insurance industry. Oh wait… our wonderful Congress is in bed with the insurance industry. Could we use the racketeering laws to clean out the corruption in congress?

Hum… there’s a thought!

You want to curb homelessness? Stop making people decide between health insurance and paying their mortgage!

That path to health insurance is a dead issue! 

I do wonder if I should get into politics. I wouldn’t run on a Make America Great Platform… I’d go for a “Fix America for All” platform.

My FAFA plan would be to take each fucked up broken aspect of our country and start fixing it. Start with Health insurance… Everybody who can pay for policies does and they pay an affordable rate, Say never more than 250 per moth per person. Streamline the Medical Professionals interaction with insurance companies making it less burdensome therefor reducing the cost overhead on the medical professionals. That should drive down costs because then it would be cheaper for the Medical folks to actually do their jobs, you know, “Treating Patients!”

FAFA could then take a look at the pharmaceutical industry and start asking why the medications cost so much in America, (Even though many of the drugs are manufactured overseas) Then we bring these drug costs into line with their actual value how much do they cost to make? How much did they cost to research? From there the costs would be normalized and the companies would still make decent profits.

Has it ever occurred to you, if we in America pay $25.00 a pill and that same pill is $5.00 in any other country, that Americans are in effect paying for all the research and development costs but 3rd world countries are reaping the benefits? In effect, American citizens are footing the bill not only for themselves and their families, but we’re also paying for the rest of the world?

Not only do our tax dollars get sent to prop up some shit hole country but with the additional costs we bear we’re subsidizing their socialized medicine too.

Moving on…

Now that I think about it.

The Mafia got into trouble for doing the same thing the insurance companies do.

One difference is that the Mafia only kills those what need killin.

Insurance companies kill indiscriminately and capriciously. 

There’s little difference in my mind between a couple of Mafia guys telling you, “Pay us and your granny’s house ain’t gonna burn down,” or an insurance company telling you, “make your payment and we’ll keep your granny’s oxygen tanks coming.”

In fact, the mafia guys are probably nicer to deal with because unlike an insurance company, they have faces.

Okay, now I’m moving on!

Time to take out my frustrations on the snow that’s piling up in the driveway.

Have a nice Thanksgiving Eve everyone.

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 I noticed a glaring error in my post. I meant to say never more than 250 per person. I I’ve amended the text. 

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If you want to test your phone, or need someone to think you’re really important… Try this!

CellexplodeOkay, 

I goes without saying that the healthcare system in this country is broken, and broken badly.

It’s been this way for years and despite all the posturing and bullshit coming form the mouths of healthcare companies, insurers and our politicians nothing has been done to make it any better. Arguably, everything the government has done has made matters worse.

One of the things that you need to deal with after losing your job is health insurance.

You can go with COBRA which will drive you into the poor house if you have savings, and often will take the entirety of your unemployment benefits. So choosing between insurance, or food, light, heat, etc. most folks will choose to eat

The last time I was on COBRA, the cost was greater than my car payment, at the time I was paying for a BMW. In the case of the car I was receiving a tangible benefit. That was the car sitting in the garage.

This time around, COBRA was not only more than my car payment but it could have made 1/2 of another car payment. I declined to pay for something that had no tangible benefit where I’d still have to pay out of pocket for medications too.

So I reached out to a broker that I’d spoken with in the past and who had been able to connect me with insurance that was reasonably priced. He returned the call, but I missed him. I called him back and left a message, despite repeated messages I’ve left for him, he hasn’t called back. Can’t blame him I can’t imagine dealing with insurance all day every day.

So I thought to myself, “I surely can do some comparison shopping on the internet.”

BOY, WAS I COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY WRONG!

There was a site, that said plainly enough “Compare Quotes” I thought great! They asked for minimum information and I was expecting a table of dollar ranges. You know, something that said;

Rape & Fuckyou Health Partners Inc. $500 – $900 monthly

Fuckyou & Yourmother Medical Inc. $700 – $2500 monthly

Nutkicker Health $300 – $899 monthly

I thought that would get me in the ball park and I’d choose the lesser of the evils and then begin the arduous process of actually dealing with a slimy insurance broker.

As I stated earlier…

I was Wrong!

Within seconds of my asking for a comparison quote my phone blew the fuck up!

It was 7 am, I’m having my first cup of coffee and the person on the one call I answered was on Meth! The conversation started out as a barrage of nonstop questions. Then another call, and another call and another call and …

They’re still calling nonstop a full hour after I pressed that button expecting a nice chart of my options. Thank god TMobile allows me to block annoying phone numbers.

But I know that call waiting works!

It’s my fault.

I knew that putting in my phone number was a bad idea. But being one or two sips into my morning coffee, well my decision making process is compromised. It’s almost as bad as drunk computing…

I’m declining all these calls from Whacko numbers and cities, and they’re not leaving voicemails so I’m assuming that everyone of these people is some kind of scumbag.

I think I may have discovered the telephone equivalent of SWATTING. All you have to do is give your worst enemy’s phone number out to a few Healthcare quote sites and you can render their phone completely useless. I’ll bet if you were to do this at say 9:00 at night you could interrupt someone’s sexual escapades. I know it’s interrupted my morning routine.

On the plus side, now I know better, I know my phone works, and I’ve learned how to really annoy someone. 

On the down side i still haven’t gotten my quote.

I’m thinking I’ll look up the insurance provider I was with before I went to my last job, and see if I can just get a policy  similar to what I had before. It was okay, covered the basics and not too expensive.

Hope you all have a great day.

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End of year Bullshit!

I hate CoveredCa and their demands where they seem to think I work for them. When they’re sending me a paycheck, I’ll get right on giving them all kinds of detailed information about my life. Until then I’m going to be sending my fucking money to the damn insurance company. I resent like HELL the State of California demanding shit from me instantaneously.

Tell me State of California Would you rather I spend 10 days collecting bullshit information that you’ll be automatically privy to come January, OR look for a job so that I can continue paying obscene taxes to provide services to others that I can’t access? I know the answer, you’d prefer I wasted the time. I was asking a rhetorical question.

I got message from DAN (Diver’s Alert Network) that my credit card on record is out of date. Uhhh DAN, the renewal isn’t for 6 months! I’ll worry about the issue in 6 fucking months!

Nerri.jpgADT Oh hi. Gee you’re JUST now getting around to sending me a letter telling me that the Credit card you had was expired? WOW, it’s ONLY two months after you sent me double billing and a nastygram. At the time we had a lovely telephone conversation wherein I gave you updated information and you billed me a past due month AND two months in advance. Gee Thanks!

I’m stressed enough right now without SERVICERS forgetting that They fucking work for ME, not the other way around.

Yeah, I’ve gone all Nebari again!

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Insurance!

As all of us in Amerika know. It’s open enrollment for our mandated healthcare plans.

I’m not overly fond of ACA, but it did actually do some good.

According to a friend who is an actuarial, there was a net gain in the number of people who previously couldn’t get health insurance now being insured.

I don’t know if that is still the case. It was true in 2013 – 2014. However it looks like the young people that ACA is dependent on, are staying away in droves in 2015.

Anyhow, I absolutely dread open enrollment. I hate having to revisit all the plans and really do miss the days when I just paid the bill and had insurance with an 80/20% split. I paid 20% the insurance company paid 80% and it was easy to figure out what was what.

Due to changes in the other half’s employment picture and my less than stellar year freelancing, this open enrollment has been particularly stressful.

We decided that we needed help. Changes in what is being phased in and what is being phased out confused the situation so that we weren’t sure if what we were doing was actually in our best interest.

SO we went to an insurance specialist who came highly recommended. Bottom line…

WE SHOULD HAVE DONE THIS SOONER!

Part of my insurance nightmare was that there were too many cooks in the soup. This guy called all the parties on the phone and declared HE is my agent and he had the ball.

Suddenly, Covered California, and Blue Shield were working together smooth as silk. Suddenly, I was paying a bit less for the same quality plan. Now instead of having to call one person, then another, and another, and get transferred to yet someone else, I call my agent. He takes care of everything.

The other half… is suddenly paying less than half what they were paying for much better coverage.

I’m still suspicious of something being too good, too easy, or too simple. We’ll see come January if our insurance is really straightened out and everything is on track for the year.

Based on the paperwork I have in hand… It looks like it really pays to have someone who knows how Obamacare works in your pocket.

That in itself speaks volumes about Obamacare and it’s complexity.

If the Republicans succeed in gutting ACA I fear we’re all going to be horrifically screwed. The insurance system is not capable of absorbing another significant disruption. Much as I hate to say it, Obamacare is here to stay. Congress should be forced to concentrate on fixing the parts that are broken.

 

 

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Yippee! I’m one of the People Anthem has Screwed again!!!!

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As expected, I got the “We’re Sorry” message from Anthem.

Anthem

Honestly I’d rather have them pony up the money for two years on my existing LifeLock membership rather than someone I’ve never heard of. 

At least The credit fixing service is based in Texas and not off shore. I note that the product Anthem is signing us up for is identity repair, NOT Identity theft monitoring.  Since there are a lot of children who were covered under Anthem Policies, Two years of repair is next to useless since children are unlikely to know that their identities have been compromised for possibly decades.

I have no children to protect in this situation, I mention it because the hot ticket in ID theft today isn’t adults, it is in fact children. The crime goes un-noticed for years and by the time a child or their parents figure out something is amiss it’s a sisyphean task to correct the damage.

Sisyphus.jpg

It’s my opinion that this email and Anthems 2 year plan is nothing more than corporate hand waving to make it look like they’re taking responsibility for their carelessness, and that they’re taking corrective action.  

I strongly suspect that the measures Mandiant suggests will be deemed as “Too Costly” especially when it’s far cheaper for them to say “We’re sorry” and pay for credit repair that most people won’t take advantage of.

My suspicion is based on experience with large corporations, as an employee and as a victim of ID theft. 

As an employee I’ve sat in meetings where cyber security was discussed and watched executives choose to risk private data (Credit, SSNs, Addresses, Phones, credit ratings, you name it…) because a breach was less expensive to deal with than spending the money on infrastructure upgrades.  The infrastructure has to be constantly upgraded and results in a year over year line item on the budget, whereas a breach is a “one time” expense and since it’s technically a “loss” it’s apparently got a more favorable tax position. 

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Ironically, the same company then lost an HR laptop that contained the whole employee database. We’re talking thousands of employees worldwide and that database residing on a laptop was in violation of the policies and procedures of the company.  Once again the response was, “We’re sorry” we’ll pay for credit repair and monitoring.

Every time I hear of another data breach and the inevitable “We’re Sorry”, I can’t help but see the South Park episode where the oil company drilling has opened a dimensional portal and allowed Cthulhu access to Earth and ushered in 1000 years of darkness…

I didn’t include the whole memo from Anthem, it was pointless. 

NewImage

Bottom line is that in addition to the three or four companies that I worked for and who allowed my data to be stolen, The couple of banks where my information has been stolen, now my data has been stolen from an insurance company.  They say they don’t believe my health records, or my credit information has been stolen but they’re less than convincing about it.

When I couple their data breach with the sudden uptick in healthcare related SPAM I have to wonder. 

My SPAM filters have been getting one hell of a workout since Dec 1 2014. I thought it was the usual bullshit running up to Christmas, but now I’m thinking it’s because of the Anthem breach.  Probably the quickest turn on the hack was to sell email addresses.

That would buy time for further analysis and allow full IDs to be pulled from the data, packaged and sold. I have no doubt that every single one of the records stolen from Anthem are already in China, Russia, or Mexico and that there are a ton of counterfeit me’s running all over the place.

SPAM

The NSA doesn’t have to spy on us, they can buy all the information they’d ever want on the open market.

Between Google, and data breaches I’ll bet the NSA is considering closing their sophisticated data monitoring centers. Think about the savings!

Yeah, I’m pissed. 

Anthem screwed me due to ACA, Anthem screwed me for an entire year of insurance that was almost completely useless, and now Anthem has screwed me again only this time the screwing will last for years

I’d honestly like to see their assets redistributed to all of us that they’ve hurt in various ways.

Maybe then Banks, Insurance Companies, The Government, and various other businesses would take data security seriously.

Update March 8, 2015

Almost Two weeks later, The Los Angeles Times published a more in-depth Op-Ed that makes many of the points I di in my post.  They wrote their article with only slightly less snark than I did.

http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-mh-anthem-is-warning-consumers-20150306-column.html#page=1