Complaint Review: Apria Healthcare - Nationwide

In March, 2015, I received a CPAP unit from Preferred Medical, whose parent company is Apria Healthcare. I was required to give them a credit card at that time. My insurance was billed, payments were made, and I assumed the small amounts being charged to my credit card were my portion of the cost. 

My insurance company continued to get constant, seemingly random claims, and refused them. When I realized my card was being charged for larger amounts, I could get no answers, so cancelled the card. I paid a bill that I received, just to be done with the whole thing. Wishful thinking on my part.

I received a letter telling me that my insurance had refused payment. I called the number given, was sent overseas, and wasn't surprised to find that Farhat wasn't available, and no one else could help me. I asked my insurance company for help, and they sent me printouts of the payments made on my account. I sent it to an Account Resolution Specialist at Apria, and was told it would go to collection for review, and I would hear back in 10 days. I never heard back, but 4 months later I received another bill for hundreds of dollars. No details, just random amounts. 

I went in to Preferred Medical twice to try to get some help, and both times they said it didn't look like I owed anything, and couldn't understand why I'd been billed.

I demanded an itemized statement and received a four page statement that was impossible to understand. I forwarded it to the senior claims adjuster at my insurance company, and she couldn't make heads or tails of it. When i was sent to collection, she helped me conference call. Our first try got us back overseas, where the rep said that he didn't see anything owing, and I could just ignore the most current bill, but he couldn't do anything about the collection situation. Our next attempt took us to a US rep who said there had been no insurance payments on my account. None.

I sent a letter to collection disputing the claim, and my insurance requested copies of the cancelled checks. They were faxed to Apria on 2/9/17. Crickets. Then I received another collection letter for a different amount - the amount the rep told me to ignore. 

This i beyond frustrating. I've already paid more than I should have. There is no doubt in my mind that if I had kept paying those bills, I'd just keep getting new ones. Nothing on the paperwork I've been given even tells what the total amount should have been, and my insurance rep was actually told from one person that I had a credit coming, and from another that they only billed the insurance company a certain amount, and got the rest from the patient. That is not the way it's supposed to work! 

I've tried to figure out where to go for help. The insurance commissioner website says it handles problems and fraud with insurance companies - not healthcare. The attorney general's office didn't have any options even close to what I've been experiencing. It's obvious that Apria creates a paperwork tangle that no one can get through so they can continue to bill. Knowing what I know now I would have just paid for the CPAP online and skipped going through Apria and saved some of this emotional stress and possible damage to my credit.

If I thought that paying the collection company would bring this nightmare to a close, I'd do it in a heartbeat. It's not a lot of money. But three or four months down the road I'd get another bill.