THIS IS NOT A BILL

We’ve all seen it – the EOB (Explanation of Benefit) with the bold lettering that proudly declares THIS IS NOT A BILL. So what is it? We called around to some insurers to find out about it and to see if they had a guide for the high math that they so often employ.

“It’s pretty easy.”

That’s what the customer service guy on the other end of the line had the audacity to say. Must be the kid from calculus class that always worked every problem at the end of the chapter. I asked him if they had a guide on how to read their EOB. They didn’t. But to his credit, he was willing to talk me through it. He started out, “It has THIS IS NOT A BILL written on it in big letters.” Thanks.

Another customer service rep said, “A guide? No we don’t have one, but you know, that’s a really good idea. We should do something like that.” His must not be so easy to read as Mr. Calculus’ or maybe he was sitting in the back of the class with me.

But there are a few insurers who put out a guide. There is even one – Humana – that publishes a guide to reading their EOB and [GASP] they have it available for download. The Humana EOB is one of the best I have seen for ease of understanding, and still it’s four pages long (And the first guy thinks people don’t need a guide? Yeah, and we didn’t need the teacher to work another problem on the board because we all got it – hah!).

Why was I doing this? Well we wanted to see how many different layouts and subtlties of semantics existed in the EOB world. So we had a small competition – see who can collect the most EOB forms from different insurors. Loser buys the coffee (Chistopher and Katrina, how do you take your java? Starbucks or Bongo Java?).

So now, in an effort to redeem myself, I am throwing it out there.

IF YOU ARE WILLING TO SHARE YOUR EOB WITH ME, POST A COMMENT.

DO NOT post your e-mail address in your comment. You have to enter it to post a comment, but it is not publicly available – it is only available to me. I’ll e-mail you with my direct e-mail address and/or fax.

You can strip off the personal data.

I don’t need to know who you are, your addess, your subscriber ID or Group ID or employer or any of your family member names. I don’t need the claim number, who you saw, what they did, the service date, how much they billed, how much your insuror discounted it, how much the insuror paid, how much was your responsibility, how much went to your deductible (OK, if you have a guide that might be helpful).

Yep. Send me your EOBs. I’m a glutton for punishment. It’s time for me to learn that high math that I thought I would never need in the real world.