AnMed Health - Anderson Medical Center Price Gouging ripoff Anderson South Carolina

Believe me, I already have a contingency plan for the next unexpected emergency and I can assure you AnMed isn't in that plan. The hospital CAN and WILL charge whatever they want to uninsureds. With Medicare, insureds are offered a "contracted" rate as well as private insurance. Uninsured patients can be billed according to the "chargemaster" prices which can be MANY times higher. In other words, hospitals can charge uninsured patients anything they want without fear of penalty.....you see, nobody regulates them!

Another tidbit which I found interesting. Representatives of our great state recently repealed Section 38-71-120 which states:

"Whenever an insurer contracts with a hospital to provide full hospital service and medical care service contracts for its policy owners in the same manner as described in Chapters 13 and 14 of Title 37 of the 1962 Code and arranges with the hospital for payment of claims under procedures described in Chapters 13 and 14 of Title 37 of the 1962 Code, the insurer is entitled to the same discounts allowed to any for the services is entitled to the same discount allowed to any insurer."

I would have gladly paid what the insurance company would pay!

I ask, where did repealing the bill benefit the citizens of South Carolina? I'm going to go out on a limb here and say the only beneficiaries were the hospitals!

Please, please, please....if you have health insurance make sure you keep it. The hospitals don't care if they ruin you financially.

but my wife was in AnMed for a routine surgery and there were many charges that when added resulted in a gross billing of $10,000/day. Do not ask me how those charges were justified. I saw nothing that should add up to $10,000/day. We have insurance so we were OK.

Maybe next time you could consider a 'medical trip' to India. All our other jobs seem to be going there, so why not go there for expensive medical care? You could even get a free tour of the Taj Mahal in Agra, India.

I did not know that a hospital could charge beyond what medicare allowed, i.e. I understood that you pay 25% and medicare pays 75% of the allowed charges. Maybe your bill reflects a Medicare improvement brought to us by the Bush Republicans?

Medical and dental charges do seem very high in SC. I guess the cost of living in SC is lower than in other parts of the US as long as you do not get sick here. Perhaps AnMed must write off a higher percentage of billings because there is a higher percentage of people in Anderson, SC who simply cannot pay those AnMed prices.

There are some HUGE income variations here: A Clemson football coach gets about $1.5 million total compensation a year while the 'average' family income in this area is $40,000 a year. County administrators and school superintendants get $140,000 a year.... And there was an unsuccessful attempt to reduce the taxes on expensive homes in SC to mitigate "owner hardships" by shifting school taxes from houses onto the sales tax. Sales taxes those families living on $40,000 a year must pay.... You can reduce your property tax by living in a less expensive house, but sales taxes are pervasive and harder to dodge.

but my wife was in AnMed for a routine surgery and there were many charges that when added resulted in a gross billing of $10,000/day. Do not ask me how those charges were justified. I saw nothing that should add up to $10,000/day. We have insurance so we were OK.

Maybe next time you could consider a 'medical trip' to India. All our other jobs seem to be going there, so why not go there for expensive medical care? You could even get a free tour of the Taj Mahal in Agra, India.

I did not know that a hospital could charge beyond what medicare allowed, i.e. I understood that you pay 25% and medicare pays 75% of the allowed charges. Maybe your bill reflects a Medicare improvement brought to us by the Bush Republicans?

Medical and dental charges do seem very high in SC. I guess the cost of living in SC is lower than in other parts of the US as long as you do not get sick here. Perhaps AnMed must write off a higher percentage of billings because there is a higher percentage of people in Anderson, SC who simply cannot pay those AnMed prices.

There are some HUGE income variations here: A Clemson football coach gets about $1.5 million total compensation a year while the 'average' family income in this area is $40,000 a year. County administrators and school superintendants get $140,000 a year.... And there was an unsuccessful attempt to reduce the taxes on expensive homes in SC to mitigate "owner hardships" by shifting school taxes from houses onto the sales tax. Sales taxes those families living on $40,000 a year must pay.... You can reduce your property tax by living in a less expensive house, but sales taxes are pervasive and harder to dodge.

but my wife was in AnMed for a routine surgery and there were many charges that when added resulted in a gross billing of $10,000/day. Do not ask me how those charges were justified. I saw nothing that should add up to $10,000/day. We have insurance so we were OK.

Maybe next time you could consider a 'medical trip' to India. All our other jobs seem to be going there, so why not go there for expensive medical care? You could even get a free tour of the Taj Mahal in Agra, India.

I did not know that a hospital could charge beyond what medicare allowed, i.e. I understood that you pay 25% and medicare pays 75% of the allowed charges. Maybe your bill reflects a Medicare improvement brought to us by the Bush Republicans?

Medical and dental charges do seem very high in SC. I guess the cost of living in SC is lower than in other parts of the US as long as you do not get sick here. Perhaps AnMed must write off a higher percentage of billings because there is a higher percentage of people in Anderson, SC who simply cannot pay those AnMed prices.

There are some HUGE income variations here: A Clemson football coach gets about $1.5 million total compensation a year while the 'average' family income in this area is $40,000 a year. County administrators and school superintendants get $140,000 a year.... And there was an unsuccessful attempt to reduce the taxes on expensive homes in SC to mitigate "owner hardships" by shifting school taxes from houses onto the sales tax. Sales taxes those families living on $40,000 a year must pay.... You can reduce your property tax by living in a less expensive house, but sales taxes are pervasive and harder to dodge.

CFO said I had until December 31, 2006 to pay in full (sounds like extortion to me) and told Congressman Barrett I had until January 16, 2006. Sent the a check for over $11,000 as good faith (assuming I could still negotiate the balance). They held my check for 2 weeks, on December 15, 2006 they sued me and THEN sent me back the check! Talk about arrogant!