An Organizational Glitch

Do you remember the incident with the insurance company sending us a check? We had thought the case was closed — both the insurance company and provider had said the provider had been paid. Then we received another bill from the provider and a check from the insurance company. We weren’t about to cash the check, so after talking to the insurance company we signed it over to the provider so we would be out of the mess.

Or so we thought. Wednesday we received a letter from the insurance company saying they had overpaid, please send them a check for the overpayment. Needless to say, I’ve spent a few hours dealing with the insurance company trying to get it all resolved. I’ll spare you the details. I do have the names of two people who promise to follow through on it, and one of them is a supervisor.
The Adventure Continues, July 12, 2014

The customer care representative did follow through, and she phoned me after she had contacted billing and had presumably settled the matter. I was impressed by her and appreciated her efforts.

Unfortunately those efforts didn’t quite work. Monday we received a second notice on the bill. I again phoned the Customer Care Unit and the woman agreed we didn’t owe anything, she would talk to billing.

This woman didn’t inspire confidence, so I went through my notes and found our photocopy of the check, showing both the front and back (where Andy signed it over to the provider). We photocopied it and sent it, along with a note explaining we didn’t owe any money, back to the billing department.

I have a feeling that might have been enough, but just to be sure I went on their website and filled out a form giving the details and asking them to please settle the matter. The site says someone will contact me in a day or two, and I do like the idea of a real person responding. Hopefully this time one of my methods might finally work.

What do you think the chances are? I actually think they’re pretty good. I think the insurance company does care about customer service so sooner or later the problem will be solved.

I do think we were wise not to cash the check and to photocopy it before we sent it off.

My list of essentials for dealing with large organizations are

(1) A speakerphone so I can do other things when I’m put on hold,
(2) A photocopy machine so we can easily document what we do, and
(3) Patience and a sense of humor.

What would be on your list?


 

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8 Responses to An Organizational Glitch

  1. Rummuser says:

    I sympathise with you. Good that you have a sense of humour. I enjoyed the banter with the HR dept of the company I recently dealt with.

    If I were you , I would simply ignore them. That is what I intend doing with my bugbear who keeps sending mail to my late father. I have even sent them a link to the blog post I have written about their ineptitude. I can do no more.

  2. Mike says:

    Sorry that this hasn’t gone away for you. I can’t recall, offhand, similar problems. I would be surprised if it doesn’t happen eventually.

  3. Ursula says:

    What would I add?

    Depending on the amount of money involved I’d just forget it.

    I have had kerfuffle of the kind you mention, and sometimes I feel it’s neither worth my time (which, generally, I give for free) nor, more importantly, having my nerves in tatters. Since I like writing I might send a letter (mainly to amuse myself and those at the receiving end) but I don’t expect anything. Took me years and years and years of ignoring letters of one of Her Majesty’s services reminding me that I owe them money. I didn’t. It was an administrative error of theirs. They patiently kept sending the reminder letters, adding charge after charge after charge, till – after one succinct phone call and appealing to the institution’s intelligence – someone’s penny dropped. Blissful silence has since descended like snow on the land. Having said that: I haven’t checked today’s post yet.

    Good luck, Jean. Sometimes it’s best to let it all wash over you, shrug your shoulders and write off the loss. Or, as I tend to do, just sit out life’s perils.

    U

    • Jean says:

      I don’t get upset, I just figure out how to tackle the problem with the minimum fuss and bother on my part. The amount was about $250, and they said we owe it. I like to get matters like this settled.

      Years ago an insurance company owed us $248 and it took me two years to get it back. I do get stubborn sometimes. Don’t like to reward people for their incompetence.

  4. Cathy in NZ says:

    I had massive problems when I stopped my home net connection but wanted to keep the land line with them…

    “:-)” when you do that your email addy provided through them will not work but for some reason some idiot kept sending my new account to it! “Guess what” – the email was bouncing at their end…

    Finally got it sorted out by fronting up at the shop that sells their products…and finding a woman there who truly could see the funny side and got it all sorted out directly with someone she knew in the billing dept…

    I have emailed them a couple of times on the matter, but I guess whomever made the error in the first place, doesn’t want to admit – “I got it so wrong” 🙂

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