Why do we need to bring our health insurance card to the doctor's?
Here’s what you need to understand about your average doctor’s office: They don’t like denied insurance claims. And guess what? YOU don’t like denied insurance claims either, because it means that you are going to get a call or message from your doctor’s office months after your appointment asking you to cough up at least a couple hundred dollars because your insurance didn’t cover that visit, or parts of that visit, for some obscure reason. I could go on, but you should get the idea that it turns into a huge pain to deal with for everyone involved, not to mention stressful for you.
More often than not, claims are denied because of some mismatch of information between your health insurance plan and what your doctor’s office has in their system. Bringing your most up-to-date insurance card with you to every doctor’s appointment is one extremely easy way to minimize the chances of those denied insurance claims. It is part of your doctor’s office’s job to double-check that the information in their system matches your most up-to-date, active insurance plan. It is your job to bring your health insurance card with you to your appointment, and make sure that it is your most up-to-date one.
Most common rebuttals:
“But I’ve had the same health insurance for X years!”
“Don’t you have it in your system already?”
“Nothing has changed.”
It is likely that if you have kept the same health insurance plan for years, there are no impactful changes to your health insurance card. However, it is standard for every health insurance plan to renew after 1 year, meaning it is possible that your health insurance plan could have changed in some way. Maybe your office visit copay is different. Maybe the billing claim address is different. Maybe everything is exactly the same. Why not let the receptionists do their jobs and check for you?
The most important information they are checking for is:
Health insurance company (BCBS, Harvard Pilgrim, Cigna, etc.)
Spelling of your name (hyphenated vs non-hyphenated matters, believe it or not)
Member ID number
Office visit copay
Phone numbers on the back (you want your doctor’s office have ready access to these numbers)
Billing address
If you visit the same doctor’s office more than once a year, it’s less important, because health insurance plans renew after 1 year, usually in January. So if it’s really a hindrance for you to carry around a thin piece of plastic year-round, just make sure you bring your health insurance card to the first doctor’s visit you have in the calendar year. Important: this applies for every separate doctor’s office you go to. So for example, your orthopedic’s office is not going to have your health insurance card info that was collected at your PCP’s office, unless you are told otherwise.
Some health insurance companies are moving to electronic, rather than physical, insurance cards. That should be even easier to pull up! Just make sure you have that ready to show the receptionist when you check in.