Thank God for this place! I am a newbie and really could use some advice from you seasoned veterans. I recently had a Chapter 13 discharge. Once it discharged, I pulled a credit report because they were free and I was suprised to find some medical collections there that did not belong to me. I immediately disputed them and one was taken off. The other through IC Systems came back as "verified". I disputed it with IC Systems as not mine and they sent a medical information form that had my name and address filled in as well as copies of my insurance card. The hand writing on the form is not mine. The debt is from 2002. In the summer of 2001, I misplaced my daytimer. It contained slots that had my insurance card (which used my SS# as my id number) in it as well as some personal information in the front of it such as my address, my employer's name, my emergency contact, my blood type, my allergies etc. I have no idea where the daytimer went or if it was just lost or maybe stolen. Around the time it came up missing, I had taken a trip out of state to my brother's home. My 18 year old niece stayed at my home to watch the animals. She admitted to some parties and said some of the attendees were people she had not met before but had come with some friends of hers. It may have been taken then. I originally thought I might have left it at my brother's home in Kansas but he never could locate it. I could have even left it on the train I take each day. It wasn't something I used as often as I should have, so it could have been left or taken from any number of places and I would not have noticed immediately. I know that this medical account resulted from my missing daytimer as the name of the employer on the medical registration form is the one that was listed in the front of the daytimer but is not my actual employer (a variation of the real employer's name was in the daytimer). Anyhow, I again disputed the account with IC Systems and asked to see the copy of any ID the person presenting for treatment may have provided as I had my driver's license and credit cards with me in my wallet when the daytimer came up missing. IC Systems said they had no ID for this person on file nor did the medical office. They say they will continue to report this account as mine because they have a file that was filled out by someone identifying themselves as me. I have never been to the medical office they are collecting for. It is not my account. I have disputed it as being unauthorized or fraudulent. I called the medical office and they claim that there is nothing they can do about it. They admit they never verfied the identity of the person who used the insurance card but too bad, so sad for me. Keep in mind that the balance after my insurance paid them is only $52. I told the office manager that I felt that they had obtained payment from my insurance company via fraudulent means and I would report the fraud to Blue Cross and file suit against the Doctor for willingly supporting this fraud by not verifying the ID of the person who used the insurance info. She told me go right ahead. I then told her that it would cost her office a great deal more than $52 to even answer a lawsuit if I filed one, she said that was fine with her. I spoke to Blue Cross, their policy is that all medical providers must verify the ID of the person presenting for treatment and this Doctor violated their policy. They say they will demand return of the payment this Doctor received if I file a complaint. I am considering this but given the attitude of this doctor's manager, it will most likely just increase the amount they are reporting to the CRA as mine. I really just want to get this collection off my credit report. It isn't mine. I just don't know how to go about it at this point as I keep hitting a wall with both the original creditor and the CA. Any advice would be appreciated.
The first step in any ID theft is to file a police report. This gives you certain rights under FACTA to demand removal of the fraud related information from your credit reports, and failing to file a police report will allow the OC and CA to continue to presume the account was yours. Once you file, and get a copy, of your police report, you can send it with your FACTA demands to the CRAs, the CA, or the OC, to get removal of the derogatory information, or copies of any records or other evidence they have, to assist you in limiting your damage. If they fail to cooperate, file complaints with your state AG, or the AG in the state where the OC or CA is located. The use of SSNs on insurance cards and drivers licenses is a practice that is known to have led to many ID thefts. Some states have recently required that insurance companies use different numbers, but this was not the case in 2002. Where or how you lost your card is irrelevant. Another party using it is ID theft, which is a crime. You also need to place a fraud alert on your credit reports, since with SSN information, the thief could be opening charge accounts in your name.
Treat the crime consistantly as what it is: ID theft. You have a responsibility to notify the insurance company, and you should probably send them a copy of your police report also. It is their responsibility to recover any payments made from the doctor, and if the doctor comes after you, knowing it is ID theft and not a legitimate charge, that is a FACTA violation also. File a complaint against the doctor with your state AG.
The problem is if you "just get it off your report" by paying it, you will probably still have a negative, paid or settled collection account showing and damaging your credit. You also don't know what else will show up at a later time (how long did it take for this bill to catch up with you?) and having settled this time, you are in a weaker position to deal with the next one. If you make your claim of theft up front, as early as you find out about it, you will be better able to get cooperation from the police and the CRAs in fixing future problems related to this theft. Not notifying the insurance company of the theft, so that they can reclaim their payment, potentially leaves you with "unclean hands" in seeking compensation from the OC and CA for their damages should they fail to remove. Notifying the insurance company, allowing them to assert their claims for fraud, or negligence, under their contract, helps you establish that the doctor's office was in fact negligent, and therefore liable to you also. Your insurance company has a bigger stick than you, so the doctor is less likely to dispute their demand for return of the payment.
Note that information lost in summer 2001 resulted in an ID theft in 2002, that took until now to be visible to you. You can have no idea what other ID thefts have been made using your information. You must file a police report with your local police. You should also file an ID theft complaint with FTC, but note that it is not a substitute for the one with your local police.
Thanks guys. Great info. My new insurance cards do NOT show my SS# on them. Blue Cross said that they had several incidents along the lines of my issue and that is why they changed the cards. They changed them last fall. I was considering a fraud alert on my credit reports and will most likely need to send a police report. I guess my biggest concern was that after all this time and such a vague idea of what might have happened would the police actually take a report? I did find another medical bill that occured around the same time at a place I had never been. They voluntarily deleted the trade line with no questions asked. This other guy is a bit more difficult to deal with. I didn't pull my credit report before because I was in a Chapter 13 and figured it would stink anyhow. Once it finished, I pulled a report and found these two items.
It is common for victims of ID theft to only find out some time after the original theft. Since they have in fact had no contact with whatever company opened the fraudulent account, it is common for the account to go to collection, a CA to track down where the victim lives, and then they finally get a bill, or see a collection tradeline on their reports months later. Under federal law, FACTA, the local police's responsibility is to handle reports of ID theft, wherever the victim lives, regardless of where the crime occurred. ID theft could have occurred anywhere, in any, or several, jurisdictions, making it unworkable for the victim to have to run around the country after the thief filing reports. The crime, and the damage from it, has also occurred where the victim lives.
Of course it is vague what has happened. You are a victim. This is not a civil case between you and the criminal. You may not even legally be able to obtain the cooperation and infomation from the various parties if you wanted to (they would probably claim "medical privacy", which is pretty hippocritical). It is not your responsibility to, as a private citizen, track down criminals. That is the responsibility of the police, and honest citizens, including doctors and CAs, are expected to cooperate. The police, either in your local jurisdiction, or where the fraudulent charge was made, may choose how much effort to expend on this case. That also has no bearing on the fact that ID theft occurred, and you have no responsibility to pay the doctor or the CA. You have no obligation to catch ID thefts using your information within some period of time to avoid being liable for them. This was not some fraudulent credit card charge. After sending a copy of the police report, and demanding that the account be removed from your credit reports as fraudulent due to ID theft, if the CA tries to pull this on you, you may want to consider legal action under FDCPA, for misrepresenting the legal status of a debt. The doctor has some responsibility for ensuring that he doesn't get defrauded, and a contractual responsibility to the insurance company to ensure he takes appropriate actions to prevent submission of fraudulent claims.
For California residents, SB168 required masking of SSNs, and phasing out their use for things like insurance cards, over a period from Jan. 2003 to July 2005.
You should also follow up with the other medical bill that was deleted, sending them notification that the charge was fraudulent, copy of police report, and a request for a copy of all of their records. Otherwise, you may find a year down the road you are dealing with it again after they sell it to a CA without notifying you. The cockroaches aren't dead until you smash them and actually see their guts.
