Hospital Billing Wrong Insurance

[nylsoj]

My question involves collection proceedings in the State of: MO

When my daughter was born in June of 2008, her father and I were not married yet. After her birth, while we were still in the hospital, we informed their billing department that she would be covered under her father's insurance and not mine. Unfortunately at that time, his insurance was just activated and he did not have his cards yet. We gave the lady in the billing department all the information she would need written down on a piece of paper. In October of 2008 (104 days after her birth to be exact) we got a bill in the mail from the hospital saying that I owed $3500 or so for my daughter's stay at the hospital because my insurance didn't cover her. They had billed my insurance instead of her father's. When I called them about this, they told me that they could try to resend it to the right insurance, but since it was past the 90 day timely filing policy they didn't know if they would cover it. I didn't hear anything from the hospital until November of 2009 when I was served with a court summons for the debt. When we received the summons, we went straight to the hospital to figure out why they had never righted their mistake. The hospital informed us that at some point between our daughter's birth and the summons, they changed to a paperless filing system and they couldn't seem to find any of our original paperwork. We provided the hospital with proof that she was added to her father's insurance the day she was born and we convinced the hospital to finally send a claim to the proper insurance (18 months after she had been born) but they failed to tell the insurance company that they had made a mistake at first. The insurance company told us that if they had filed a claim notifying them of the mistake made at her birth, they would have covered it. I informed the attorney representing the hospital of everything the hospital had told us and that I refused to pay for their mistake. I told him that if further actions took place, I would get legal help. I did not hear anything from them since January of 2010 until today. They sent an order for wage garnishment to my new job with the total amount now equaling just shy of $8000.

What are the chances that I have a lawsuit on my hands here to keep them from garnishing me for their mistake? Or would I be better off filing for bankruptcy so I wouldn't have to pay them for charges that I shouldn't owe?

[jk]

What are the chances that I have a lawsuit on my hands here to keep them from garnishing me for their mistake?

0% The debt has already been established. Garnishment is simply a means for them to collect on the judgment.

bankruptcy? a very drastic action for that amount of debt. If you have a lot of other debts, this might kick you over the edge but in itself, I wouldn't even consider it. It will wreak havoc with your credit in ways you don't even realize right now. It will affect every debt you have and every creditor you deal with.


simple refusing to pay for what you deem their error has no legal weight, as you see now.

[cbg]

When you did not receive an Explanation of Benefits confirming that the bill had been paid, and you called your husband's insurance to confirm that the bill had been received, what did they say?