Published Feb 10, 2011
stefanyjoy
252 Posts
Arghhh!!! I need to vent!!!!!!!!!!!!
So I've been working in customer service/claims/escalations/you-name-it at a major health insurance company for the past 5 years. First, the place is run by complete and utter MORONS! If I informed the media of half the idiocy that runs amok at that place, especially with how often it has been in the news re: health care reform, they would have a damn FIELD DAY! Second, I have always been able to work at 250% of production goals at that place. Not because I'm some call taking, claim adjusting, crazy machine, but because everyone else is so stupid that the bar is incredibly low. Every day it never ceases to amaze me that my co-workers actually have the ability (which they use frequently) to completely destroy someone's life, deny or ignore claims worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, because they are TOO LAZY TO RESEARCH ANYTHING. If anyone here has ever worked in a call center before, you will know that it is the most horrid, soul-sucking job in the entire world. It used to not be as bad as it is now, but when the economy crashed, they used it as an excuse to treat everyone as terribly as possible and cut all incentives, and when people complained they would say, "You should be so lucky you have a job! No one else is hiring!" THE BAD ECONOMY IS NOT AN EXCUSE TO TREAT FAITHFUL, HARDWORKING EMPLOYEES LIKE COMPLETE CRAP AND CALL THEM "LUCKY". Then lay off a bunch of people to outsource their jobs to India and then beam at the end-of-quarter meeting that we are 20 million dollars under budget! Like we're supposed to swallow our new $2,000 deductibles and cut benefits from the company we WORK FOR and just :yeah: because the CEO's and big whigs are gonna be able to split 20 million dollars amongs themselves! WOOO!!!
After 5 years in customer service/insurance, I can honestly say my soul has grown tattered. I do not have the empathy for people that I once had, and this is one of the major reasons I've decided to become a nurse. I need my humanity back. I want to feel something, anything. I simply cannot wait to get started and start making a difference in someone's life. If I even took phone calls from members, doctors, anyone else, I would maybe feel better about being able to help people NOW, but I only take phone calls from other insurance companies. And all those people have **** for brains too. Somebody shoot me!!!!
/vent
Ok, I feel a lot better now. I am so happy I am back in school now. After work I always have class stuff to look forward to, and it makes me feel so good to be progressing in my life. Thank you for listening, AN :)
2ndyearstudent, CNA
382 Posts
Well said. I am thankful for every day since I quite the corporate hamster wheel. That sucked.
lukeybaby
14 Posts
i just laughed so hard.....i too worked in insurance. call center. slightly over 3 yrs.....man oh man, can i relate to you!? starting my accelerated bsn program in the fall!!!! so excited. good luck with your journey and thanks for the laugh
lillymom
204 Posts
I hate to say this since you work there but I despise insurance companies!!! I do prior authorizations for pharmacy medications in a specialty office and it is a pain in the butt. Occasionally I will get someone like you who knows what they are talking about, but for the most part I have to talk to people who have no idea what I am talking about and can't even come clost to pronouncing diagnosis and treatments.
I get so mad when all I can do is check yes or no. Sometimes they are easier but sometimes there are circumstaces that don't fit and they will ignore the statements hand written on the paper because it is not in a checked yes or no box!! It then has to go to appeal which can take up to a month or longer. What is the pt. supposed to do for thier med if they can't afford it and we don't have samples? UGH!
HouTx, BSN, MSN, EdD
9,051 Posts
I can SO empathize!!! But the healthcare industry does not have a lock on soul-sucking jobs. A young colleague told me about her (part time while in nursing school) job as a stocker/ go-fer for a nationwide department store chain. She had variable, insane hours & was frequently told to perform the most icky tasks because no one else wanted to..... like regularly mopping up urine in the dressing rooms (ACK!) All this for $6.50 an hour - sheesh.
I hate to say this since you work there but I despise insurance companies!!!
Maybe you didn't pick it up from from my post, but I don't like them either No, seriously, I can sympathize with how frusterated these providers get to verify benefits, check claim status and do pre-auths, because most of the customer service reps have very little education, and know nothing about the healthcare industry. When I started here 5 years ago, my training was 6 weeks, and it was all on how to use the computer programs they still had from the 80's. I'm talking green screens and Oregon Trail here, people. And this was in 2006. Not much has changed since, either. There was absolutely no training on the actual business of healthcare. That is why if you call a health insurance company 5 times on the same issue, you will get 5 different answers, because information is really dependent on the representative's research style and "give-a-****" level of the moment. And the supervisors know even less than the CSR's. My boss is a complete idiot and does not even know how to use our computer system, yet he is our escalation manager. It makes me crazy that he gets paid 2x as much as I do and all he does is figure out ways to delegate work to other people because he does not understand the business at all.