Help Negotiating Dental Bill
I recently moved and changed dentists. I scheduled appts for myself and 2 kids for an in network dentist. After visit I received a letter from the dentist stating that dentist would be going out of network but nothing should change with routine cleaning as those visits are usually covered. I took this letter as word and should have called insurance to confirm but did not (I accept full responsibility on this). I kept my kids appts because they are hard to get and I didn’t want to have to delay if I didn’t have to and letter made it sound like there’d be no issues. 1st son went, no issues with billing. 2nd son goes a month later and insurance rejects the bill. Dentist sends me a bill showing no payments and a negotiated balance of $140, down from $268. I call insurance to inquire and they paid $68 from negotiated amount. Now I get a bill 2 months later and they say I now owe $200, which is not the negotiated rates. My son is 4 and he had a basic cleaning, dentist looked at his teeth for 2 mins and he had fluoride. This is insane. Our previous dentist without insurance was $100 for kids appts which included all of the above plus X-rays. I feel that they should a least honor the negotiated rates especially since the first bill reflected this amount and their out of network letter was misleading.
Tips for negotiating?