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Medicare Slamming

Sun, 04/24/2005 - 11:00pm — Karen Stevenson
Description: 
Kris Hundley of the St Petersburg Times reports on a disturbing incident where an unwary senior citizen who thought she was discussing coverage for her drug costs found herself unwillingly enrolled in a Medicare HMO. A salesman came to her door to ask her if she was interested in having her drug bills paid. When she said she certainly was interested in that, she was pressured into signing papers to sign up for a Medicare HMO that included drug coverage. She soon found out that none of her doctors was in the HMO network and told the salesman not to sign her up until she had time to think more about it, but when she went to the doctor she found the change had been made and her bills were no longer covered under traditional Medicare. Eventually things got straightened out, but the story raises a question about whether other seniors in other parts of the country are falling for this kind of pitch. Kris calls it "slamming" in reference to the practices of the telephone providers who got in trouble a couple years ago for "slamming" people into new telephone service plans without their full understanding of what was going on. Read the full story on the St Petersburg Times web site.
Kris Hundley of the St Petersburg Times reports on a disturbing incident where an unwary senior citizen who thought she was discussing coverage for her drug costs found herself unwillingly enrolled in a Medicare HMO. A salesman came to her door to ask her if she was interested in having her drug bills paid. When she said she certainly was interested in that, she was pressured into signing papers to sign up for a Medicare HMO that included drug coverage. She soon found out that none of her doctors was in the HMO network and told the salesman not to sign her up until she had time to think more about it, but when she went to the doctor she found the change had been made and her bills were no longer covered under traditional Medicare. Eventually things got straightened out, but the story raises a question about whether other seniors in other parts of the country are falling for this kind of pitch. Kris calls it "slamming" in reference to the practices of the telephone providers who got in trouble a couple years ago for "slamming" people into new telephone service plans without their full understanding of what was going on. Read the full story on the St Petersburg Times web site.