We have seen this happen quite frequently with huge personal injury law firms in major cities and clients that live in remote areas. There are many reasons doctors in these remote regions don’t want to work with attorneys from the “big city”. In some cases unethical doctors will try and steer you away from the big city attorneys, saying they wont or do not work with them because they don’t pay.
A doctor’s primary focus needs to be the patient, not the payment. However, after he has been not paid or reduced his bill to such a low amount by the same attorney, it’s hard to swallow. An attorney might have a hard time finding a doctor in a remote area that will treat his patients.
The doctor won’t see me because of the attorney i retained
A doctor who will not see you because of the lawyer you chose should tell you a little bit about the lawyer. A good lawyer will always make sure a Doctor’s bill will get paid. It’s good business for the Attorney to pay the doctor because the doctor in turn might send the attorney some business in the future.
Large firms who do heavy advertising and rely on that advertising for business. And, in some cases do not pay the doctor or reduce his bill to such a low amount, it would have been better for him to write it off as a loss. Smaller firms tend to want to establish relationships with doctors in any areas for which there firm can service. They do a great job presenting clients and work with the doctors to get the bills paid.
Some Attorneys will take the med pay and then try to negotiate the Doctors bill to a lower amount
The first time this happens to a doctor that treats auto accidents will be the last time he ever treats a patient from that attorneys office. We have a hard time believing this is even legal. Med pay or medical payments was designed to pay a patient’s medical expenses up to a certain dollar amount specified in the auto policy. It does not pay legal fees, it pays medical treatment for auto accident victims. What some attorneys will do is collect the med pay, put it into the trust account.
Negotiate Doctors Bills for treatment
They will try to negotiate the doctors bill to a lower rate, sometimes as low as 25% of the original bill, and then add the balance back into the settlement for the attorney and client to split. We are not sure how this is legal, but have seen it done many times. I’m sure the attorney view on it is they are putting more money in the clients pockets and making them happy, but at the same time they are lining their own pockets with money that should have been paid to the doctor who performed the services.
There are plenty of good personal injury attorneys who do not do this. Not all large law firms practice this, but most of time when it happens, it does come from a larger firm.
Attorneys won’t pay the medical
Attorneys won’t pay the medicalDoctors who won’t treat you because of the attorney you have retained should tell you a lot about the attorney. They are not going to put there time and effort into seeing a patient for 4-8 weeks and not be compensated for it. Doctors just like attorney’s office’s have overhead and employees they must pay. When you have an attorney who won’t pay the bill, why would a doctor want to see his clients.
We get emails from time to time from patients seeking a doctor that they have already retained a lawyer. The lawyer should have handled this , but did not. One of the reasons might be because no doctors in the clients area will work with that particular attorney to see his client, so who suffers in the long run, the client or patient does. They either have to driver further for medical care or come out of pocket to see a doctor close to them all because there personal injury lawyer at one time or another would not do the right thing and pay the doctors bill.
If you need to find a doctor close to you that treats auto accidents , use our zip code search function in the upper right hand corner of every page on our website. If we do not have one listed in your area, please contact us and we will try and find you one.