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I just had an experience which makes me wish that we had health care as good as the postal service. I packaged up a large envelope; ordered, paid for, and printed a label on-line with postage for Priority Mail; and dropped the envelope in the outside collection bin at the local post office before the last pick-up on Sat (5 pm, I believe) as I ran errands (didn't even have to get out of my car). I asked to get e-mail confirmation of delivery (for free). My envelope was processed in Tempe/Phoenix by noon on Sunday, arrived in Pittsburgh at 4 am today, and was delivered by 11 am this morning! All for $4.80. Yes, the post office does sometimes screw up ... and it often makes big news when it does. But when I think about the volume of mail that moves around this country, the post office is pretty amazing. I mean, they moved my piece of mail 2000+ miles across the country and delivered it to the door in less than 48 hours over a weekend (they had said 2 - 3 days, I assumed business days). Unless they managed to deliver it to the wrong address (in which case I will be very embarrassed by this post), I consider that pretty damn good.
In contrast, I have been fighting with my health insurance company for a month to get some claims paid. I had my own insurance through my work which I lost when I lost my job - at which point I switched to my partner's insurance policy through the same employer (same company, same group number). My MDs made one mistake - the listed me as self insured instead of insured as a dependent. So, even though the "member ID number" was correct and the group number was correct, the insurance company chose to use group number and the self insured designation to process the claim under my OLD ID number and denied it because (rightfully) I was no longer insured under that number. It has taken me 4 phone calls to MAYBE finally get it fixed. In the meantime I keep getting e-mails about an important claim that was processed but, because it is a closed account, I can't even access the on-line system to check what claims they are talking about.
Oh, I'll take the post office over insurance companies any day!
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