Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum Y'all ever heard of this ?

A few weeks ago a family friend was involved in an auto accident. The other driver was at fault. She suffered some broken bones and was taken to the hospital, where she gave them her BC/BS health insurance card. She will require a couple of surgeries, and has already had one surgery. BC/BS initially paid some money for claims, but has now demanded the money back from the hospital and other providers, saying that her car insurance should cover the health costs. Other driver doesn't have anything, so sueing him is useless. She now owes thousands of dollars for healthcare, and evidently will owe thousands more if her auto insurance policy doesn't pay up. Friends of mine who work in the healthcare and insurance business say this a result of cost-shifting that occurred with Obamacare, and is becoming increasingly more common. She has been referred to a lawyer, which is going to cost even more money.

When she first told me about the situation I didn't want to believe it, but apparently if you are in a car accident you need to show the healthcare providers your auto insurance card and hope you have enough coverage to pay the bills.

Anybody ever heard of this?

2 words ....... Alexander Shunnarah

If there EVER was a case for him, this is it!

In the end there will be a judge that reviews everything. The auto insurance may pay, depending on the policy. Judge will determine that. He will also determine who gets money and who doesn't. Either way, it's not her problem. She has insurance on both sides, they can fight it out in court, but it shouldn't fall on her.

What he said. BCBS and the Auto insurance company can fight it out over who should pay but ultimately it should be one or the other. Just because they disagree doesn't mean they get to just opt out and dump the whole bill back on her.

Thanks for the feedback. I increased my umbrella coverage with my auto insurance today.

Auto insurance is the primary provider where a wreck is involved. Medical insurance used to pay under a subrogation agreement where they were reimbursed from a final settlement. That may have changed so that the auto insurance has to pay the hospital directly now instead of reimbursing the medical provider.

If she has Medicare, they will get involved for reimbursement too.

Uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage kicks in on her own auto policy if she didn't opt out of it after the maximum on the other driver's policy is recovered. If you have up to three vehicles, the coverage of those vehicles is stacked in your favor.

Time to lawyer up and keep the insurance companies in line and negotiate a settlement in her favor and not allow the insurance companies to take care of their own interests at her expense. She has damages that will cover her attorney's fees and more. He will know how to negotiate, and she should get some pretty good compensation after attorney's fees due to her suffering.

As bad as I hate to admit it, we need lawyers like Shunnarah because the insurance companies have screwed the system up so badly in their own favor. They love it when you just allow your insurance company to handle it "for you" and don't have your own legal representation to protect your interests.

Unless you claim you were injured and want to collect for medical expenses, pain and suffering, you'll likely come out on the losing end for property damages. That's the cold hard truth from my experience.

I'm not a lawyer, and don't pretend to be, but my lawyer taught me some of this stuff after I got tired of getting screwed by insurance companies and you can take it for what it's worth to you.

I'm currently going through this same thing from a wreck I had in Dec 0f 2016. She needs a lawyer. If she doesn't get one she will never recover the costs of her medical treatments and related charges. I got in so over my head I finally called a lawyer for help because I could no longer handle it. There should be no shame in holding the insurance company accountable for covering what you pay for in your policy. Lawyer up.

Key words, obama care. Thank a demoncrat.

Been there done that. Health insurance companies want the car insurance company to pay first. What it boils down to is when she presented for medical treatment related a car accident they put in her health insurance instead of a default mechanism to send the bill to her car insurance company. They should have never put in her health insurance since it was a car accident. Same thing if your at home, you fall and break your leg. They are gonna go after your home insurance policy first before the health insurance. Same thing if someone hurts themselves on your property. Even though they file it under their insurance, don't be surprised if they call you once its been denied. Just FYI on that.

We had a wreck in 2008 that was caused by a drunk guy walking down the middle of the interstate late one night. We all had health insurance, the other guy had nothing and since he was walking they couldn't go after his insurance company. My sister in law crushed her foot and required emergency surgery to put some pins and screws in. My brother ended up about $30k in debt from hospital bills because of that. We were in my brothers truck and he just had like $5k per person/occurrence for medical on his policy so my brothers insurance covered $5k of her bills but he still ended up stuck paying the $30k which he's still paying for just a little at a time and my sister in law was suppose to have another surgery on it about 5 years ago but hasn't had it yet. We ended up with a lawyer and in a room for half a day for a mediation over it but the drunk guy that coulda very easily killed us all walked away without even a slap on the wrist. My ex wife had 2 fractured vertebrae from that wreck that still gives her problems now and always will.

I think thats what uninsured motorist is for. A guy hit and totalled a truck i just bought one time. I lost it all. I didnt buy the uninsured motorist coverage.

There is some correct information and some very very wrong information in this thread.

First, never never never give the hospital your auto insurance information. They should never be paying the hospital before blue cross. None of this changed as a result of Obamacare. BCBS has got to pay under contract. They do have a lien against any recovery you get from the at fault person or his insurance. If he is not insured or is underinsured then they can recover the same from your underinsured/uninsured coverage.

99% of the time BCBS will except pennies on the dollar as a settlement with you (not your auto insurance). The auto insurance will pay it, but you have to be made whole, or as close to whole as possible first.

Hire a lawyer. It will not cost you any out of pocket money. I will be happy to talk to you about it. I resisted getting into personal injury for years. But in the last 2-3 years we have recovered several million dollars for people.

As an example we had a case with a client who had $106,000 in medical bills. The at fault driver only had $100,000 in coverage. His health insurance paid the first $5,000 and then refused to pay anymore. We reached a policy limit settlement, got the health insurance to not seek recovery and got the hospital to accept $8,000 for the remainder owed on the bill. They wrote off $93,000 dollars. Our client ended up taking home over $50,000 when before he hired us he was going to owe $6,000. So he had a net gain of close to $50,000.

Isn't it great how insurance premiums go up and customer service goes down. They basically became a government organization once Obamacare kicked in. BCBS might as well be the DMV. They know you aren't gonna stop paying them so they do what they want.

What doekiller said !

Been there done that with my daughter in '11, she was hit by a grossly under insured driver. The average , heck above average feller CAN NOT handle these situations themselves . Hire a GOOD lawyer who is well versed in auto accidents , insurance claims and such.

Agreed.

If you don't hire a lawyer, than you're the only party involved that is left without competent legal representation. Guess who gets the shaft?

That's why I just changed my umbrella coverage, Trox. Increased it to $500,000 specific and $1,000,000 aggregate for medical. Wasn't very expensive to do either.