Last month, I was laid off. I opted into COBRA with a start date of 04/01. The paperwork was sent to me last Wednesday, I elected into it Thursday, and paid my premium on Friday. Today, I logged into Cigna and it's showing I'm inactive with no insurance. After a few hours of customer service between the COBRA intermediary (WageWorks), they assured me I'm active and it takes a couple of weeks for Cigna to process. They sent things over yesterday and said my insurance would be dated 04/01. On the chat, Cigna wasn't able to help very much (which I understand). Is there anything else I should work on during this transitional time? Or, have others had success with waiting and letting the process work itself out? Thank you all so much!

A couple of weeks ago a gentleman ran the stop sign in front of my house and used my new mudroom as a stopping mechanism. We were told to get an estimate from a contractor and they would cut us a check. We got a detailed estimate and the insurance company sent it out for review. The review came back with a 6000.00$ reduction in the estimate due to not enough detail on the labor side of the estimate. The insurance agent said that we could accept the money while we submitted an updated more detailed estimate to get the extra 6000.00$. Should we take the money while we wait for the contractor to update the estimate or should we get the updated estimate first?

I started getting calls asking if I am accepting new patients. I just said, I am sorry but you have the wrong number. After the fourth call I asked who they were trying to reach. I was told the name of the doctors office and read the number to me. It is my personal number and I have had it for 22 years. I went onto Blue Cross Blue Shield site and looked up the office and it does show my number. I contacted BCBS and they told me that they looked it up online and it is a different number listed there but they cannot do anything. She then told me to call the office and see if I could get them to change it in the providers portal. No one is returning my calls from this office, so no help there. I can't not answer my phone as I use it for my business. Any suggestions or insights would be greatly appreciated.

In December of last year, I purchased a plan from the Georgia Marketplace. A dental plan. I have called 4 of the offices mentioned under their provider tab and nobody accepts this insurance (solstice -Essential Smile GA- Total Care). One of the dental offices even mentioned that that particular insurance does not cover anything. Would this count as bad faith, false advertising or a 23 year-old learning the hard way about America's health/insurance issues.

We were uninsured for awhile, and honestly, it wasn't that bad. We had a 94% discount from the hospital we used and had a great experience with them for many years. Fast forward to last year, we officially got insurance. Cigna. We have an HSA account and a high deductible. We spend SO much money, but I view this as paying for peace of mind so if anything horrendous happened we would be covered. Now, I just got word that our hospital is discontinuing service with Cigna and everything is going to be considered out-of-network. This is a blow to our family because 2 out of the 4 of us require specialists. My son is medically complex and the hospital has a children's hospital wing where he sees 5 specialists a year and may need surgery in the coming years. I've spent years finding a medical team that works for our family and they're all at this establishment. It's all being pulled out from under us...it takes effect in 3 weeks. I don't know what to do now....should we go back to being uninsured? How do we shop around for insurance? Should I look into catastrophic insurance? A friend recommended US Health Group but after searching this sub I'm hesitant. Key points: 1) We make too much money for any form of government assistance (however, we are NOT wealthy) 2) We live 2 hours away from the next closest children's hospital and I have yet to find out if they accept Cigna. 3) How do I vet an insurance company? TIA

About a week ago, I was stopped in traffic when a woman rear-ended me. I won’t go into all the details, but she was a bit evasive at the scene. She did give me her insurance information, though. I only have liability coverage through my own policy, so I filed a third-party claim with hers. I called her insurance today, and they told me she hasn’t responded to their attempts to get her statement. The evidence is pretty clear - she had a license plate cover on the front of her car, and the text from it literally left an imprint, like a stamp, dead center on the rear bumper of my car. I really need my car, but my rear bumper is sagging, and I don’t think it’s safe to keep driving it like this. Based on her behavior at the scene and the fact that she’s now ghosting her insurance, I have a strong feeling she’s just going to keep evading responsibility. Given this, I’m wondering: is it okay if I pay out of pocket to fix my car now and then sue her in California small claims court to recover the cost? If so, what kind of evidence should I gather to make my case? For example, should I ask the auto body shop for a written statement detailing the damage and cost to repair? Thanks in advance.

I was in an accident 12/29. My car was totaled by my insurance company (State Farm). They called my creditor (Upstart) to get a payoff total. They gave my claims agent a “10-day guarantee payoff quote.” The insurance company sent the payment in full and it processed within 4 days. The insurance company now owns the title of the car (I’ve confirmed this twice). I theoretically should owe nothing on this loan as the quote given was paid in full and the title has already been transferred. However, the creditor is still trying to charge me my monthly payments. My claims agent said they called and confirmed with the creditor that everything was indeed taken care of and the car has been paid off. He said I should no longer be getting charged payments. I figured maybe it would just take time to process the transfer or the loan payoff but my account is now past due because they’ve tried to take 2 more monthly payments. I have called several times to dispute it (because I was told it should not be my responsibility as the loan was already paid in full!) but they just say they’ll transfer me to a supervisor and then I’m on hold for 30 minutes before the line just disconnects. I’ve emailed. I’ve called. I don’t know what else to do and I cannot afford to pay these extra payments with accrued interest and late fees but it just keeps accruing. Nor should I have to since the creditor doesn’t even own the car anymore and they got all the money they asked for. Any advice in this situation is appreciated.

Hello, I have a few questions how to handle my PCP or Labcorp messing up with my insurance details. I had a bloodwork taken at my primary care and apparently they sent it to Labcorp. But Labcorp billed my insurance with the incorrect details apparently - my name and Member ID, group number are wrong. I got a mail in Feb asking for insurance details but the return address was not online on their website, so I thought it was phishing. I called the Billing department and asked them if they needed my insurance details, and they said "it is pending with insurance and there is nothing you have to do but wait". I don't have this call recorded. Today I got the invoice number and it says the below: "Reason for Bill: We attempted to file a claim with insurance. According to BLUES NJ: HORIZON BCBS, the patient name or subscriber number did not match their records. This balance is now the patient responsibility" I don't want this to impact my credit score but I don't want to pay $1000 since my PCP or they made mistake that I had nothing to do with. I will call them tomorrow morning but I have a few questions. 1. Since they dumped the responsibility on me, can I sort of force them to refile with insurance? What do I do if they refuse? 2. How long generally do I have to sort this out (not paying) so it doesn't impact me. Thank you for taking the time to read this. I'm just pretty pissed right now so apologies if I sound rude.

Wondering if anybody has any advice or information they could give me I live in California and have progressive. I made a claim back in January to get a chip fixed with Safelite and that chip still turned into a full crack across my windshield my insurance went up and the deductible to get the windshield replaced was 500, so I decided not to do it Here we are now in July and I do want to get it replaced, but I don’t know if it’s better to just pay out-of-pocket or go through my insurance again with the risk of my monthly going up. Is there a way I can talk to my insurance so that my monthly payment doesn’t go up or should I just pay out-of-pocket. TIA !

I recently got into a car accident where I was rear-ended. The only damages were to my bumper and trunk. Geico gave me $2,000 to start repairs and said the shop could request more money if needed. I decided to take my car to Mercedes so dealer parts would be used. Mercedes told me they’d handle everything, but for two weeks I heard nothing from them or Geico. Then Geico called and said my car would be a total loss because Mercedes’ estimate was $9,671, which they said was above the 75% threshold. Geico valued my 2017 Mercedes C300 at $12,636. I did my own evaluation, adding in features/options Geico left out and $5,200 worth of maintenance I’d just done a week before the accident. After I sent my report, Geico updated the value to $15,453. At that value, the repair cost is clearly under the 75% threshold. Instead of changing the decision, Geico switched it from a “construction loss” to a “financial loss” and still marked it as salvage. Meanwhile, Mercedes had already taken my car apart without telling me, which caused storage fees to pile up, around $6,000. I was told the fees would only be waived if I fixed my car with them, which basically left me with no choice. What made me upset is that Geico ended up paying Mercedes about $7,700 for the initial estimate and storage fees, instead of just approving the $9,671 to fix the car. When I finally got my car back, it was still disassembled, with the bumper and parts thrown inside. Mercedes didn’t even bother to put it back together after being paid thousands of dollars. Given my car’s updated value, the repair cost is way below the 75% threshold, so how is it still being considered a total loss? I even asked if I could take it to a different shop for another estimate (since Mercedes is more expensive), and was told no. This whole process feels really unfair, and I don’t understand why my car is being treated as a total loss when it shouldn’t be.