Patients are required to pay their annual deductibles each year, when applicable, before insurance companies will consider payment for any or all of an insurance claim.

Providers are responsible for collecting any outstanding deductibles from their patients. Any outstanding deductibles should be collected at the time the services are provided to the patient.

Are providers requesting deductible and co-insurance payments from their patients? Waiving patient's responsibility of any Insurance Deductibles and/or Co-Insurance on a regular basis is a HUGE no-no for providers. The only exception to this rule is when there is a real hardship on the patient, and in that case, providers are expected to obtain a completed hardship form from their patients, and keep it in their patient's medical record, in the financial/business section.

Providers cannot routinely waive and write off deductibles and co-insurance that patients are responsible for. I'm astounded when I hear of providers who continue to do this, perhaps just to attract more patients or out of pure ignorance. In my opinion, that is just bad business.

Patients should always be well informed of any potential out of pocket expense that they may be responsible for, prior to receiving services and/or items from a provider. This can be accomplished by providers thoroughly verifying the patient's insurance and inquiring of specific benefit details pertaining to the type of care the patient is to receive.

Patients should then be educated on the findings (results) and provided with a patient Financial Responsibility Worksheet or Form, advising of their out of pocket expense(s), so the patient can make a informed decision as to whether they want to proceed with the services/items they receive from the provider, when ordered by their physician.