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Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

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Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

Long story short:

I went to the ER back in 2017, I had medicaid at the time through the state of IL.

The emergency department, which the hospital outsourced, claims I owe over $300.

So today I log into my CR and notice a collection from a "Phenoix Financial Services".

They are collecting on behalf of "Pendrick Capital Partners", who I have searched and it says they are super unethical.

The Pheonix Financial Services...I've sent them disputes. They called me and harrasingly said they will only remove it if I pay them. They won't dispute it and claim to have "no formal dispute process".

I tried contacting IL Medicaid but since it was 2 years ago and I moved..they don't have that info...and they would not be able to remove it anyway.

I tried contacting the emergency department...but they were sold to another company and they claim they wrote it off and no longer have anything to do with it.

 

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 1 of 15
14 REPLIES 14
Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

I also forgot to mention that when you call them..they rattle off your full name, fulll SSN and dob...which I'm sure is a violation of some kind of law. Their numerous BBB complaints state this as well.

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 2 of 15
Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

After doing some more research, it appears disputing with them will do NO GOOD.

I read several dozen BBB complaints and the actions peformed by Pheonix indicate they are some kind of "fly by night" type of company.

 

Not sure where to go next...CFPB? BBB? Dispute with EQ?

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 3 of 15
Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

I disputed the account with EX and they sent me an email saying they deleted it.

Yay..right?

WRONG!

After they deleted it...I get another alert saying my score went down 36 points!

Why?

 

Edit...I'm reading on here other people have had issues with removed collections dropping their score.

This was a collection account..not a credit card that had good payment history then charged off..so this was 100% negative.

My score went down when it was added..and even more when removed.

 

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 4 of 15
simplegirl
Valued Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

It would depend on where your getting your scores from. If they are from CK those vantage scores will go up and down for the weirdiest things but Fico is a different and as for Fico it could be something else maybe.








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Message 5 of 15
Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

Experian's website doesn't explain a score decrease...it just shows it happened.

I tried calling them..but their phone number is 100% automated...if you press 0 or ask for an agent it just says "please contact us in writing at:" then hangs up.

Unbelieveable a company that handles highly sensitive personal info has no way to talk to a human being.

This is "customer service" in 2019.

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 6 of 15
Cleaningitup2016
Frequent Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

What a time to be alive...

I finally found a number to get ahold of a live person at EX.

Waited on hold 37 minutes...

They told me they "cannot tell me the reason why my Fico dropped 36 points" and "if I don't agree with it..I should contact FICO".

Are you kidding me? You can send me an alert saying my score dropped..but don't know why?

 

Credit Card companies have a name for those who pay their bill in full each month: Deadbeats
Message 7 of 15
Jnbmom
Credit Mentor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.


@Cleaningitup2016 wrote:

What a time to be alive...

I finally found a number to get ahold of a live person at EX.

Waited on hold 37 minutes...

They told me they "cannot tell me the reason why my Fico dropped 36 points" and "if I don't agree with it..I should contact FICO".

Are you kidding me? You can send me an alert saying my score dropped..but don't know why?

 


Contact FICO? That is a scoring model, wow just wow😠

EXP 780 EQ 791TU 795
Message 8 of 15
Remedios
Credit Mentor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.


@Cleaningitup2016 wrote:

Experian's website doesn't explain a score decrease...it just shows it happened.

I tried calling them..but their phone number is 100% automated...if you press 0 or ask for an agent it just says "please contact us in writing at:" then hangs up.

Unbelieveable a company that handles highly sensitive personal info has no way to talk to a human being.

This is "customer service" in 2019.


 

EX CSR (or any CRA CSR) will never be able to explain to you how the actual algorithm calculates score. 

99% of Fair Isaac employees would not be able to to, either. It's a proprietary info, not something we just call and get. 

 

With that said, one thing to keep in mind is that "us" as in general public..we're not CRAs customers. Lenders are. Sure, they peddle reports and cards, but their partnership is with lenders. We're just source of data, nothing more.  

 

As to why your score dropped, anything could have changed. You still have other derogs. One could have updated and coincided with collection removal. Look over all your reports and compare them with previous one. 

 

Message 9 of 15
FireMedic1
Community Leader
Mega Contributor

Re: Unpaid hospital bill nightmare.

$300 isnt a whole lot of money to have a collections deleted from your reports. ER's charge as a hospital. And the ER Docs charge also as a group that works in the ER. Probably came from them. Hospitals have to abide by CMS laws with Medicare and Medicaid patients. Been working ER's PT for 35 yrs now.


Message 10 of 15
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