If you receive a balance bill or believe you are overcharged, request an itemized bill and dispute the charges. Ask the provider or hospital for an itemized bill with all billing codes listed. Your billing codes should be five-digit procedure codes. Make sure you’re not relying on a hospital bill that only shows three to five numbers or letters without proper procedure coding. After I receive the five-digit procedure codes from my clients, I inform them of what the reasonable and customary charges should be. In almost every case where we review that information, I find major savings. In one recent case, the bill went from $32,000 down to $1,500. Please remember: five-digit numbers. Call me if you need any help at all. Thank you.
