Love, Jimmie

I’ve waffled a little on writing this post.  I don’t want to be unfair to a business because of my one bad experience.  Also, the service industry I’m going to discuss is rather an emotional one for me so I realize that I may not be entirely fair.  However, they have gone and ticked me off for the last time and I’m not going to be nice to them anymore.  I feel like they have fully earned this.  Congratulations, LifeSigns.  This is for you.   

Back story:  I signed up for a new type of health coverage this year.  I went with an HSA plan which, to make a long plan short, means only one thing of importance here:  1) all preventive care is paid at 100%.  Yearly physicals are considered preventive and I heard about a company who classify all of the tests (ie: blood work, pap, mammo, vitamin levels, etc.) as preventive.  As a matter of fact, that company has often visited our office to give Lunch and Learns, participated in our health fairs and regularly brings us general healthy information.  I liked them a great deal and the representative who visits with us is great. You can see why I was swayed.

I was excited as one can be about having a full physical when I made my appointment.  What I was really looking forward to was getting it all done in one fell swoop and working with the staff that I had heard great things about.  Unfortunately for them, I need great staff.  Actually, I need exceptional staff. 

See, I have this issue about going to the Cookie Doctor. (Think about it for a minute.  You’ll get it.)    I’m not a fan.  If you want to know the truth, I’m an emotional hot mess about it and have been known to curse like a sailor, throw a tantrum, cry until I burst a blood vessel and say horrible, horrible things like, “No YOU calm down!  If you would get naked, too, and put on this damn paper towel and let me position the headlight and the platypus and the mile-long q-tip near YOUR nether regions, I would calm down!  I don’t give a rat’s ass that it would be unprofessional for you to do that.  You do it and then you can tell me to calm down!”  I’m such a joy to be around.

Next up, though, are all the reasons they failed and truly, have nothing to do with my bad behavior.

1. They lost my appointment.  This is why I never received a reminder call or the emailed paperwork I was to bring with me for my appointment. I was relieved, honestly.
2. They called me 30 minutes before my originally scheduled appointment to ask me if I had indeed fasted.  I was bewildered, seeing as how the day before they admitted that they had no appointment for me.
3. We rescheduled my appointment and they asked me to bring a check for the services I was to receive.  I was indignant.  All the information I had received from them indicated that my tests would be considered preventive and thus, covered 100%, no co-pay, no deductible.
4. I lost the argument and promised to bring the $35 it would cost me for the appointment, an amount we had debated at great length and an amount they assured me would be all I would ever need to pay. I was resigned. 
5. I arrived for my appointment and was asked to pay $45.  I was angry.  Turns out they forgot to tell me about the administration fee despite my asking repeatedly if there would be other charges.
6. All exams were performed, all veins were stuck, all ultrasounds of vital organs were completed and I left, exhausted, cried out, and without any lingering mascara.  I left it (along with my pride, my dignity and my good graces) on the  roll of coloring paper they let you lie on as a nice sanitary crinkly table cover. I was a mess. 
7. The physician (who, even after experiencing the loveliness and calm and raging blood pressure that is me when they hand me the paper towel to put on for the exam, handled me beautifully and never once felt compelled by my arguments or cursing to don her own paper towel while performing all my exams) assured me that I would have all results within the week.  I was gullible.
8. I did receive my results.  I did.  But only after being promised that they were mailed twice, emailed once, emailed again, and then found in some long lost archive that IT had managed to institute with the implementation of a new program.  It seems that only my results had been sent there, though, and no one could figure out why I could never get them.  Boy howdy, I was ticked. 
9. Turns out I’m not slated to die any time soon but apparently, I could use an attitude adjustment.  I was thankful.   
10. Yesterday, and this will be a complete shock to you, I received a bill for the services LifeSigns performed.  You know, those services that fall under the 100%-paid preventive care and also the services that I paid for in advance.  I am speechless.   

Possibly speechless is the wrong word.  There was lots of this: @##%^$%!!!!! And some of this: &^%**$##@@#!!!!!!! And then more of this:  @#$$%$!#@#$$%%)*! And then I calmed down and wrote it all up for you. 

Really, I feel as if I’m being noble and merciful by giving LifeSigns an F++.  Don’t you?