Hello,
I've never posted but have been reading these boards for a long time. My husband and I went through some hard times about 8 years ago, and had tons of collections and C/O's. This whole mess was do to him losing his job. Anyway, we waited years for things to drop off or go away, had to set up payment plans with a few, but now these are all old. We do ok, financially, but are on a budget.
About 2 years ago, my son broke his finger and had to have surgery, then I gave birth to our daughter a couple of months later. We have insurance, but still managed to accrue about $4000 in medical debt. I kept putting off calling the hospital to set something up, and these ended up in collections. I thought they were all mine, but 1 of the 8 ended up on my husbands CR. 3 of them are small office visit charges that were never billed to us, and would have been paid at the time of the visit. I tried a PFD, and they said they don't do that. I also tried to settle and they came back with a $3700 settlement, not a lot in the grand scheme of things, but way more than we have. Then I got a letter from a lawyer threatening a lawsuit unless I disputed. So I sent a DVL, and they sent back the breakdown of what we were charged for, but nothing with our signature on it. I've tried calling the hospital a couple of times, and got the run around, and eventually they told me I have to work with the CA. I guess I'm just wondering what to do now. Send a letter to the hospital? If I just send money to the hospital will they accept it? Try to renegotiate a settlement? Again I know it's not a ton of money to a lot of people, but when you live paycheck to paycheck, it seems impossible. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!
