I’m retired and use Blue Cross as my medical insurer; Blue Cross, in turn, links to Medicare for its portion of my medical cost payments. Whenever I get medical service and incur a cost, a notice of the payment allocation is sent to me in the form of an Explanation of Benefits or EOB. That’s fine. It’s normally a one-page outline showing the provider, his charge, the Medicare discounted fee (which discount is criminally large), the amount paid by the insurance, and my portion of the payment if any.
But in addition to this one page come two additional pages. One is a description of my right to appeal the EOB allocation decision along with several paragraphs regarding how to appeal and of the appeal process. Why isn’t it sufficient to include this notice in the annual documents sent to the subscriber rather than waste the paper to send with every EOB?
The second page (two-sided) is a Notice of Language Assistance. This consists of a short paragraph in English as follows:
No Cost Language Services. You can get an interpreter. You can get documents read to you and some sent to you in your language. For help call us at the number listed on your ID card or 1-888-254-2721. For more help call the CA Dept. of Insurance at 1-800-927-4357 English
This is followed by the same message in thirteen additional languages! Is this paper necessary? It could also be included with the annual subscriber documents. Better yet, eliminate the service and require those asking for Medicaid support to use English (or pay for their own interpretation).
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