This review is not meant as a complaint or as a means of revenge for what happened, but to warn others. In September of 2012, I began going here. Before receiving services, I asked Dr. Shakeri if my insurance would cover it. He called them for my benefits then told me that I wouldn't be covered because I had not yet met my yearly deductible of $250. He told me that once I met the deductible I would be fully covered for up to 12 visits. He instructed me to pay him my deductible ($250) to proceed, so I did. Once 2013 hit and my $250 deductible was due again (he again told me), I told him I couldn't afford it and would no longer see him. Instead, he said not to worry about my insurance and to instead only pay him a copay for each visit. Sounded reasonable.
Fast forward 10 months to July of 2013, 15 or so office visits later and 5 months after my last visit, I received a phone call from Dr. Shakeri saying that my insurance did not cover any of my visits because I was maxed out of my benefits and that my bill was about $950 of which he would like to receive from me as soon as possible. I was completely in shock. Didn't he tell me that he spoke with my insurance and that I would be eligible for coverage after paying him $250? Where was this coming from? I proceeded to call my insurance myself, and they told me that I had maxed out of my benefits in May of 2012, 6 months prior to me ever seeing Dr. Shakeri and before he supposedly ever contacted them. Yet somehow the information he gave me initially was not that I was maxed out, but that I just had not met my deductible. The question then is, who told him that I needed to meet my deductible? Anyone? Or did he make it up to receive money from me? Had I known I wasn't covered, I never would have gone through with any of it.
I met up with Dr. Shakeri to discuss the charges and was shocked by his behavior. He had a compassionless expression and every question I asked him was met with a quick reply and a defense; quickly retorting repeatedly that none of it was his responsibility. His need to be so defensive and aggressive appeared like he knew he had messed up. I wondered if he was in some financial trouble and needed to get money to dig himself out of a hole. He was acting shady. When I questioned him about the initial insurance information he gave me, he told me that it was my responsibility to know my benefits, not him. Legally this is probably true, however it is not uncommon for doctors to check a patient's benefits for them and proceed, and the fact is that he told me wrong information. Yet he didn't want to take any responsibility for it. He even lied to me by saying that upon meeting him I told him that I had used 6 or 7 of my 12 visits allowed by insurance. If this was true, then first of all he wouldn't have prompted me to pay him the $250 deductible to get it rolling because using 6 or 7 would have meant that the deductible was already paid AND he wouldn't have then proceeded to have me see him 12 times the rest of 2012. That would mean that he would have willingly saw me 7 times over my benefits limit. The fact was, I never claimed that I had used 6 or 7 visits; he was lying to my face to rid himself of responsibility. When I brought up the deductible I paid him to "begin" my benefits as instructed and the deal he had made with me to give copays for 2013 instead of insurance he responded that he had no recollection of these conversations. No recollection? How is that he seemed to "remember" for all the months that I saw him and gave him only a copay and yet all of a sudden when he wants an unexpected bill he has forgotten? Why would I have paid him that money had he never told me to pay it in order to meet my deductible? It did not add up.
More than the money, seeing how cruel and self-seeking the human race can be was sad. Even if he truly had been honest to me from the beginning about my insurance, the logical explanation I can come up with was that he misunderstood my benefits and gave me false information that led me to proceed with the services. If this was the case, in my opinion an upstanding human being would waive the fees or at least offer to split the amount with me, owning up to the fact that he did make a mistake. No mercy whatsoever came from him. He wanted money and he wanted every penny. What he did end up deducting from my final bill was the $250 that I had paid him in the beginning and the few 2013 visit office fees that I should not have been billed for. Altogether I still paid him around $800 for everything. The reality that a grown man with likely a healthy income could mislead then pinch pennies from a twenty-something-year-old woman with nearly nothing to her name is disgusting to me. I will take responsibility for not verifying my benefits myself and for believing him, but ethically I believe you should be able to trust the word of your healthcare professional. It made me sick. Do not trust his word or his character. read more
