In Nov. I submitted an invoice with attached receipts (for items such as prescription medications) to my insurance company for re-imbursement. In Dec. I received a call from the company requesting I get one more receipt for them, which I did. In Jan. I called the company wondering why my cheque had not yet arrived from them. Was told they had no record of ever having received a claim from me. I rounded-up a duplicate batch of receipts and went to their office, completing another invoice in their presence and handing the package to them. Two weeks later I received a cheque for partial re-imbursement: some of the receipts were now dated too long ago, even though they hadn't been when I had originally submitted the invoice in Nov.

In Jan. I submitted a "blank cheques" request to the company that supplies cheques for my bank. The only change I requested was that they leave the "19" off the date line because I knew the box of cheques would last me through this year and into the next. A couple of weeks later the company phoned me, saying that the change I had requested would take a month...could I wait that long? I said "yes." Today I called my bank to ask about the progress of the blank cheques. The person I talked with said she would call the cheque company; she soon called me back to say the cheque company had no record of my having put-in a cheque request.

Is anyone else encountering such instances of "vanishing data?"

-- nodata (nodata@here.com), March 11, 1999

Answers

Blue Cross/Blue Shield has been having major problems, look into the archives for threads where we discussed this.

Funny that you should mention it, I just opened my mail now and recieved a wooping bill from the radiology associates of the hospital where I had an emergency last summer. My insurance didn't pay them. I'm with Blue Cross. Oh boy.

-- Chris (catsy@pond.com), March 11, 1999.

Chris, had the same thing happen to us just 2 month ago... they said we had no referal from our main Dr. and sent us the bill. I called and said... 1) since when do I need a referal for anything being insured with Blue Cross/Blue Schield and 2) I had a referal where is it? After 3 weeks they finaly admitted they had a problem with the computer and paid the claim.

-- rickjohn (rickjohn1@yahoo.com), March 11, 1999.

We got an outlandish AT&T bill back in... December? We got a letter the following week stating that it was mistake and to ignore it. My mother and my friend also received AT&T bills with the wrong amount and the follow up letters.

-- Helen (sstaten@fullnet.net), March 11, 1999.

Chris,

In my case, the insurance company was Aetna.

-- nodata (nodata@here.com), March 11, 1999.