Daughter over 18, still using child support health insurance card-what do we do?

Question

My husband had to pay for health insurance for his daughter as part of his court ordered child support. The child turned 18 two years ago and my husband cancelled the insurance coverage. His daughter has still been using the cancelled health insurance card for the past 2 years. She is not in college/school. My husband just found out that she has been using his name as "the responsible bill-paying party" when she would go to different docs. He now has alot of her current med bills on his credit report. What can we do about this?

Answer 1

He can sue her, but technically, unless your step daughter was a minor, SHE is the responsible party. In fact, if she was a minor, and his ex wife took her to the doctor the ex would be the responsible party. The responsible party is the one that consents to treatment, not the insurance card holder. Even if the "insurance" is in his name. I would be calling theses doctors first and pitching a ***** and I would tell them that I will be reporting them to the Better business Bureau for all the inaccurate billing(I would be nice at first, but if I didn't see them trying to straighten this out I would start to get nasty). For one, she is over 18, so he can't be held responsible, and two they should have been calling the insurance company BEFORE EVERY appointment to insure she still had coverage. If they want their money tell them to go after HER.

Answer 2

You will want to talk to your husband's daughter and get a full list of all of the different bills that she has claimed your husband as the "responsible bill paying party" (or at the very least just find out which doctor's or clinics she has gone to and then contact them directly for an itemized list). This way you will not be hit with any additional surprises on your credit report for bills that do not yet show up on the credit report but will in the future.



Now that you have the itemized list of what you owe then your best bet (outside of taking your daughter to small claims court) is to contact each of the medical providers directly and work out a settlement.



After this is done then you will want to make sure that your daughter does the responsible thing and purchases her own health insurance policy. Since she is young she will be able to find a fairly cheap individual health insurance policy on the open market.



Here is some more information on finding an individual health insurance plan and also some information on finding student health insurance if she is a student:

Answer 3

As horrible as it sounds, sue her for fraud & damages. Really there isn't anything much else you can do. You can also go through the painstaking process of contacting every single one of these doc offices that appear on the credit report & make them prove that your husband "SIGNED" something saying he was the responsible party. If they can't produce it, they have no case & have to drop the collection. I know you don't want to wait until THEY take you to court over the unpaid med bills, as that would be super expensive. If you can try & prove to them they are wrong before it gets that far you will save money. It will be a big hassle, but that's really all you can do. They don't want to go to court any more than you do, so they will try to get you to "settle" out of court to pay these things, but when you don't budge & refuse to pay them & insist that they PROVE you are the liable party, they will probably give up & admit that you are right & then they MUST remove it from your credit report. The other option that may or may not work is to open a dispute with each credit reporting agency over everyone of those bills. Then the credit reporting agencies will contact them & demand proof, when they can't provide it, it will have to be removed. Like I said, a lot of work, but it can be done. I had a similar problem & I use similar loosely here. My husband filed bankruptcy about 3 years before we got married & recently we've had all kinds of bill collectors contacting us & threating court, putting things onto his credit report from years ago, etc etc. We had to mail a complete copy of his bankruptcy to everyone of those places before they would stop to prove they couldn't hassle us. Everything stoped & was removed from his credit report promptly as we could have sued them for harrassment. But it took months to straighten out. I know there's a big difference there, but even in your case it will take lots of time & lots of effort to fix.

Answer 4

The insurance company should deny the claim and then she would be responsible for her own bills. Something isn't right in your story. Without valid insurance, they would bill her not him. It takes a phone call to the Doctor and the Insurance Company to clear it up. Someone is not being honest.

Answer 5

1st he needs to contact the daughter and tell her she is no longer covered as of her 18th birthday and he will be sending her these bills, next he needs to contact the insurance company and let them know what is going on, 3rd if the statements or bills have the Dr's or provider names on them he needs to call each of them and let them know the situation and have his name and insurance removed from her file. This is considered freud, make sure he lets his daughter know she is responsible for these bills. Next he can dispute the bills with the credit reporting agencies simply by writing to them, explaining the situation naming each providor and they will investigate. The provider technically should have had his signature for the "responsible bill paying party" not just her word which is why he needs to call each of them and tell them they need to send the bills to his daughter in her name.

Answer 6

You should gather all the medical bills and contact Charity Care. If she's not working or making very little, they should pick it up. An interesting thing about medical bills though, is that it doesn't appear on your credit report. So somebody's telling a fib.



*ADD* Well color me stupid. I assumed it was so, because I owed about $30K in medical bills and they've never appeared on my credit report. My Charity Care answer still stands though.

Answer 7

You contact the insurance company and they will sue the daughter for the money. In fact, they may even lodge a complaint and levy fraud charges through the state.



It isn't hard to figure out. It's the insurance company's problem, not yours. The coverage was cancelled and it's the responsibility of the carrier to catch these things and deny payment.

Answer 8

First off, don't listen to "married mommy" and sue the poor kid just for trying to get herself decent medical care! Call the docs and explain the misunderstanding. They will most likel settle for pennies on the dollar and/or waive much of the cost as they would rather get something from Dad then nothing from the daughter.

Answer 9

She is over 18 so he can probably press charges (although I doubt he would do that). The only other thing is to sit down with her and make her understand that she is responsible for her medical bills. She is an adult and is not in school so she needs to handle this on her own.

Answer 10

How could the card be used when it was canceled? The providers CHECK the VALIDITY of the card when it is presented. Plus insurance cards have expiration dates at year's end. Is there something else to this story?

Answer 11

If she is not covered under his insurance the card is useless. Has he talked to HIS daughter. If she is going to the Dr. and is sick maybe he can help her. IT IS HIS DAUGHTER. When your child turns 18 does not mean they still don't need your help. I mean has anyone told her the card is no good?

Answer 12

contact the credit report agency and tell them that she is over 18 and that she is responsible ..dispute it.. I had one try to get me to pay also.. they will try ..but you don't have.. call the 3 major one... equifax..trans union and i forget the other one.. he will have to contact them..but it can be taken off..and he need to get that card back from her ..asap..

Answer 13

Doesn't matter she can use the insurance until she is 22

Answer 14

Sounds like all you'd have to do is show proof from your husbands employer that he cancelled her from the policy.

Answer 15

Take her to Judge Judy's court. I'd love to watch that!

Answer 16

call each and every doctor, and take his name off, and since she is 18, she is responsible. he never signed anything, he cannot be held accountable.

Answer 17

Sue her in small claims court.... Sounds like she doesn't respect him very much.

Answer 18

sue her