Money Matters
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Re: Hospital not working with us
I'm not sure if the last budget I posted here was current. I think a few things will have changed on it.
I have found a cell plan we'll be switching to once my contract ends that should save us about $50 a month without losing anything we currently use. It may be worthwhile to switch DH and DD over sooner, but we'd have to look into that. We'll have to purchase different phones for the other plan as well.
DD is here for the summer, so there won't be any CS payments until Sept. We do budget more for food, entertainment, laundry, bus fare, and she gets an allowance also. I think we still wind up spending about $100 less the months she is here.
One good thing is that I just met with the Aflac rep for my new job and I was able to get myself and my DH on a new indemnity policy for illness and accidents that will lessen the burden considerably if my DH is hospitalized again. Their usual policies exclude him because of his health conditions, but this new one doesn't. There is a 12 month wait period for pre-existing conditions, but I think over time it will pay for itself. We got a hell of a deal on it because we are both pretty young. It will cost us about $61 a month and pays out $1000 per hospital stay up to two per year, $100 per ambulance, $25 per doctor visit and a few others.
"Make it very clear that you want to and plan to pay it in full but that you need more than 3 months to do it. Tell them exactly how many months you need. 6? 8? 10? Go to them with a plan and be ready to negotiate on it. As a good faith measure, plan to make a sizeable payment up front to demonstrate to them your seriousness."
I think this is probably the best thing you can do to show them that you do truly plan to pay. With this new healthcare reform act a lot of hospitals and healthcare providers are going to be losing a lot of money. And they are going to be very serious about getting the money that is owed to them.
i work in medical billing for a national ambulence company and they make it clear to us not to pressure the patient for money. why???
because medical bills can be sold to collections and they will show up on your credit report as a debt that is not paid.... BUT...
THEY DON'T EFFECT YOUR CREDIT SCORE.
keep paying on the debt. your report will show all your payments. don't miss a payment. this will show as well. and what's best is when it shows you paid it off.
when i went to buy a home for the first time i was in the process of paying off my ex husband's credit in order to improve his credit score. the mortgage person at the bank told me not to pay off any of the medical because that wouldn't improve his score. medical is unavoidable where as maxing out your credit card is.
my read shelf:
I have been an occasional lurker for awhile but your post made me want to create an account so I can tell you I feel your pain. We have had ALOT of medical issues in our family in the past few years (to the tune of more than $50k, give or take, that WE were billed for.) Some providers would work with us, some won't. I never put this stuff on a credit card because then we wouldn't be able to make the credit card minimum payments each month (and I THINK that would have more of a negative impact on your credit than paying less than the minimum -but still paying- on your medical debt) ONE provider in particular said the same thing yours did, only 3 months. However, we owed over $6,000 to them. Our monthly MINIMUM payment would have been $2,000/month, almost all of our net income at the time. And that was just to one provider. There were easily a dozen others reaching into our pockets as well. We paid what we could and snowballed alot of it. Some providers wrote off some or all of what we owed. The one that we owed over $6k to, however we just sent them like $20 a month. They did send it to "collections" but it was an in house agency, owned by the hospital. They were easier to work with and they said they would not report on our credit (and they didn't) As long as we paid the promised $20/month. This went on for almost 2 years, we never missed a payment. Then one day I got a nasty letter from an outside agency threatening legal action since I never paid the bill. I called them and they said they could not honor the $20 month, the best they could do was $800/month. I called the original collection agency who was taking our $20/month and all they could tell me was the account was no longer with them so they could not look into the account history to see what went wrong. we ended up taking out another loan to pay that, so it's paid, but not really. We still have tons of consumer debt related to these medical issues, (can't work while in the hospital) and now there are more medical issues and more bills on the way.
I think some on here, though they mean well, I am sure, were a little harsh. Yeah, I totally get that I should probably not eat anything other than beans and rice for the rest of my life. I also don't deserve a haircut because I got sick instead. And who needs lights? I should do all my reading of library books in the daytime only to save on electricity. Oh and I really shouldn't be typing this from my home computer (insert eye roll here).
Really though, you just have to do what you can, and that's all you can do. I am probably going to get really flamed for saying we have in the past and may have to again consider bankruptcy because of all of these medical bills. I do what I can. We bought a house cheaper than what we could afford (this back when we thought we were healthy, I know people who run out and get themselves sick or injured and therefore buried in debt have no right owning a house). We don't go on vacation unless someone else (family) pays our way. We rarely go out to eat. I coupon. I meal plan. I rarely get a haircut (was 2x a year, but my last haircut was 7 months ago and we just don't have the money this month). Seriously. We look like cave people. I cut my husband's hair. We don't buy clothes unless very necessary, but then it's goodwill and the thrift store. No smartphones. No extra curricular activities for the kids. I do, however, love my internet (and to justify it anyone ready to flame me for it I do use it for couponing) and the kids have Netflix for when its raining (which is often).
I wish we made 6 figures (which we don't) and could cut out the Starbucks (which I haven't been to in years) and the everything cable package (which we don't even have basic) As well as the housekeeper and kids soccer (drool). If some of you are able to do this, good for you. I can't. It doesn't sound like OP has this luxury either.
But please remember OP and I are human and we do need SOME creature comforts as well as those of you who make 6 figures or less but have been blessed with good health and overall good fortune. I am not suggesting the OP go crazy on spending or anything, but cut her a break with the haircuts and And her phone. Sheesh! It's medical debt for crying out loud. I know debt is debt, but it's not like she or her H CHOSE to keep getting sick/hospitalized. If she said she spent $2k at the mall last weekend on designer clothing and is freaking out because she can't pay her credit card bill, then, well, that would be a little different, I think.
And, OP, I don't know if this is still the case, but when we bought our house, MH had some OLD medical debt on his credit. We were told by our mortgage broker that it doesn't impact your score, and they don't even think its that big a deal. He told us not to worry about it affecting our home buying (and it didn't). This was several years ago though and I have heard the home buying process and credit requirements are stricter now, so I don't know if that changes how medical debt affects your credit now.