3 On Your Side: Family Dermatology Patients Allege They're Being Double Billed
By Jim Donovan
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- They say they're getting bills they don't even owe, and when they try to get answers they're simply ignored. 3 On Your Side Consumer Reporter Jim Donovan tells us about a medical practice whose patients say they're getting double billed.
Dr. Paula Nelson isn't talking, but others certainly are. They're alleging double billing at Family Dermatology, a chain of medical practices operated throughout the east by Dr. Paula Nelson and her husband Yinka Adesokan.
Three years after Ashlee Landes visited a Family Dermatology office in Bucks County she received a bill from a collections agency for a whopping $551 bucks. She says, "I thought this has to be as mistake," adding, "I've never had to pay that much extra for going to a doctor or seeing a specialist. So that really raised a red flag for me."
Ashlee says she always pays her co-pay immediately. When she reached out to the collections company for more information, she couldn't get any. According to Ashlee, "He said if you don't pay this bill by the end of the day today we are going to put this on your credit."
Stan Stalnaker says he keeps getting bogus bills too. He says, "My insurance company determined I do not owe any more than what I'd already paid." Stan visited a Family Dermatology office in Berks County in 2010. Yet at least once a year he gets another bill. He says, "I can't even get a hold of them."
"It would just ring and there would be points where they'd get the voicemail and then it would say, 'sorry this mailbox is full'," says Amanda Kohler. She worked for 5 months at Family Dermatology and says she saw it happening first hand. Amanda says, "We were directed to give them a billing number that they would be able to talk to someone directly. It was supposed to be based out of Georgia."
Court documents show that Family Dermatology made over $35 million in 2012 alone. Headquartered in Atlanta, Nelson and her husband live in an $8 million dollar mansion and drive around in luxury cars. But there are plenty of frustrated patients there too. The CBS TV station in Atlanta has been investigating similar billing complaints.
Jerry Disney was a patient of Family Dermatology in Georgia. He says he got multiple bills too. "One bill would say I owe $780, one bill would say I owe $1,200, one bill would say I owe $600."
The Better Business Bureau put out an alert after receiving over 143 complaints from patients claiming they were overbilled and ignored. Mike Boynton of the B.B.B. says, "We sent the complaints to the company. We asked for their prompt response and we got no response."
The Department of Justice recently went after Family Dermatology for improperly billing Medicare. The company agreed to settle the allegations for $3.2 million.
When 3 On Your Side paid a visit to Dr. Nelson's Berks County office she refused explain why patients were being double billed. Instead she said we were harassing her with our questions. But it's Family Dermatology's former patients who say they're being harassed, with bogus bills, and it needs to stop. Ashlee Landes says, "I feel bad for people who are just getting these bills and paying it, because it's not right."
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