Monday Morning Rant

This is a new one on me. Ok so everyone knows I moved about a year ago, 40 miles closer to Philly. I've slowly been finding new doctors in our area, but I put off scheduling my annual appoinment with a new OB/GYN until recently. I had been relying on my old doctor to keep calling in prescriptions for my birth control, but they quit giving me refills in order to get me to make an annual appointment. So I finally got sick of calling and begging for a refill every single month, and made an appointment with a new doc locally.

All things considered, I decided it was pretty important to have my records transferred to the new doc before this appointment, so I called and the girl said "Just write us a letter requesting the transfer and we'll take care of it." So three weeks before the appointment I sent said letter.

This weekend I got a return letter from my old docter's office which said something like "We have received your request for a transfer of records. The state enacted some law that allows us to charge you for that service. Your file is 63 pages long. You need to send us $50 and THEN we will transfer your records." ACK!! How incredibly rude! I have had records transferred from this doctor two or three times before and have never been charged.

I called them this morning to complain.

Me: "Can I just come pick them up and take them with me to save the money?"

Secretarty: "No, you'll still be charged the same amount."

Me: "But that's a lot of money! I've never been charged before!"

Sec.: "The state says we can charge you. We don't even charge the max the state allows."

Me: "Nobody told me about this when I called! Now even if I send you the money, the records probably won't get there in time!"

Sec: "If you send the check this week I guarantee they'll get there before your appointment."

Me: "This is so not fair. They're MY records. My new doctor really NEEDS them."

Sec: "I'm sorry."

Me: "What am I supposed to do, try to tell the new doc from memory my entire history, including what we did to get pregnant, all the tests, the pregnancy details, labor and delivery details, etc?"

Sec: "No, you're supposed to send us the $50."

Me: "Fine, I give up. You'll get your check."