What exactly are medical bills paying for anyway? Not address books or competent debt collectors apparently.

[ck4829]

You're e-begging on GoFundMe for relief from them, you're taking on debt because of them, you're getting your wages garnished because of them, they dwarf the ones in other countries, you're afraid to use our healthcare system because of them, and you're going into bankruptcy because of them.

But what exactly do medical bills pay for?

Address books or some other way of knowing if there are two people with the same name in the area, then information is going to the right person, right? Right?

Well... not exactly.

Medical bills can rack up quickly. One Youngstown man continues to receive notice after notice of unpaid medical bills in the mail.

The problem is they're not for him. One patient with the same name racked up thousands of dollars worth of unpaid bills but was sent to the wrong man. It's an issue James Vaughn of Youngstown can't seem to fix and now Trumbull Insight's closure is yet another roadblock.

The issues began in 2018 when a Trumbull Regional Medical Center patient with the same name was billed $1,614.00. But those bills were sent to the 'wrong' James Vaughn's house. Vaughn called the hospital to get the issue figured out as he is still unsure how his address was even affiliated with the 'other' James Vaughn.

However, handfuls of notices have continued to arrive at Vaughn's house since. On Friday, April 11, Vaughn received a notice from a debt collection agency saying he still owed the money. He was unsuccessful in getting a hold of the debt collection agency that contacted him.

https://www.wfmj.com/story/52687685/medical-bill-mixup-sends-samename-man-to-collections

So again, what exactly are medical bills paying for anyway?

[spooky3]

1. Some debt collectors are truly scum. Years ago several were harassing

Me about bills of someone whose name was SIMILAR but definitely not the same as mine. She didn’t live in the same town or even the same county. How stupid do you have to be to do that? I wrote each to tell them to fuck off and cited laws, and eventually they stopped bugging me.

Oh, and how did I know about her? I googled her—she’s a real estate agent with info all over the web.