Does my surgeon's office know what they are doing?

I called my surgeon's nurse on Thursday and was told that they had not heard from my insurance company and would call them, as my insurance company only takes one week for approval (BCBS FED) and it had been two weeks.  I had called later that day and she hadn't heard anything and she would be on vacation the following week....Go figure.  I asked if there was someone I could talk to in the office during her vacation and she gave me a name and extension, which I called this morning and guess what......She can't get into her system so I have to wait until next week.  WTH.  This is horrible and I will be calling her first thing Monday morning and letting her know.  I should not have to chase these docs around to get things taken care of.  You would think that they have some kind of system so they know who is waiting for approval, who has been approved and call the insurance company before the patient is nagging them.  Oh, done venting....


Have a great day.  I will make the best of this week.

How much help do you think they will be when you have  a medical problem?  You can have a great doctor but if the staff is unresponsive or unavailable, you are in a bind.  Something to consider.  I've been there.

My Dr's office submitted my information to insurance at 4pm on a Thursday at by 5pm on Friday they were calling me with approval and with a surgery date! So that's less than 24 hours from submission to calling me back. It really sounds like your office has no idea what they're doing (I have BCBS)

Well, I think most office staffs are pretty stupid, sorry but they are.  They don't communicate I found....sound like the girl who went on vacation failed to mention to the other girl that she was giving all her patients over to her while she was gone.  BUT!  I have a worse story of office staff stupidity!

My dr and I talked and decided I would get a sleeve.  That was sent to my insurance company, they called me with in a week and said "your approved" and set a date.  I was happy.  Then I got a call about a week later (1 week prior to surgery) saying that I was denied the sleeve, but I was approved for the RNY.  Huh?  Um, ok!  I never even thought about getting the RNY, did not research on it.  After a long day of phone calls I realized that if I wanted this surgery and I wanted it paid for by my insurance I was getting the band or the RNY.  Band was out of the questions so I told them the RNY was fine.  My surgery time and date stayed the same.

I get to the hospital, I am in the admitting room and the nurse is prepping me and getting me ready when she says "so you are here today for the sleeve?"  I was so confused.  WHAT!  I said I thought I was denied the sleeve, has that changed, cause now I wanted the RNY after really looking into it.  OMG!  It was OLD paper work that some medical clerk forgot to take out of the file and had I not have said anything (which that thought did run in my mind) I would have had the sleeve and I bet my insurance company would not have paid for it.

In the end I guess it all worked out, but man!  REALLY!  This is not a game!  These are people's lives you would think they would be alot more serious! 

Can you give the insurance company a call directly?  I have heard of people doing that and finding out they are approved, or finding out that their surgeon's office didn't submit everything.
Good luck and I hope you find out soon.

While the office staff may be incompetent (mine was) the surgeon may be very good! Why don't you call your insurance company directly to see if you are approved yet? That's what I did. Then I waited to see how long it would take for the Dr. Office to finally call me to say i was approved. It took an additional four days. Luckily, I already knew I had been approved.

 You can call your insurance company directly.

They can inform you of where they are in the process, submission, review, approval and then the approval confirmation.

I second (or third) the idea of calling your insurance directly. Not only will they tell you that you are approved (when you are) but they will fax you a letter of approval so that your doctors office doesn't have to (heaven forbid) wait to get one in the mail...

I went through all the crap with the first  surgeon's office that I dealt with....  I had all the incompetence, lack of compassion... etc... that I could stand.

I changed doctor's 5 months into my process (just at the time when insurance was approved) I just couldnt handle it anymore. And I thought " if is is THIS bad before.. what is it gonna be like after they have my money/my ins money....?!?!?!?!" What if I really need them?

Best decision of my life. I had to go 3 hours away, but is has been worth EVERY mile of it. The staff really cares, really follows up, really listens... and you get access to the doctor if and when you need it...

Anyway, I think I got off on a tangent.... but I would call ins myself. I did... EVERY DAY in fact!!!
I bet you are already approved..... Good luck!!

I had some serious problems with the first surgeon I selected.  They would never return a call or email and then when I was able to get in touch with them after numerous attempts, they would lie to me and give me a runaround.

I finally got tired of their unprofessional behavior and unresponsiveness.  One day my husband suggested that if I had those types of problems prior to the surgery it would only get worse.  I could only imagine having a problem after surgery and not being able to get anyone to call me back.

I immediately made the change and it was the right decision.

You can call the insurance company directly and may get information from them.  However, it won't solve the problem of the sorry office staff.