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captainsblogTwo words: not good.
Late this morning: As she's posted, Eleanor headed off for an eye exam and the likely replacement of her lenses. She wound up with dilated pupils and a massive pain in the ass.
Opticians are one of those fringes of the profession that don't get good coverage in most insurance plans, and thus need to rely on gimmicks to make them even relatively affordable. My drill earlier this year- slightly discounted exam and not-at-all-discounted frames and lenses- ran a bit over $300. Literally a day later, a Living Social deal arrived for a different provider that would have knocked 70 percent off that. I bought it, gave it to Emily, and she experienced grief of her own because the dealio place wouldn't accept her prior "outdated" prescription and the old one refused to update it without a full-price exam.
So last week, I sought out the deal ahead of time, and wound up with the one tied to a major McNewspaper chain:
Yeah, that one. It offered $200 of value at a three-shop local chain for 36 bucks. Eleanor went today; they'd already told her she couldn't use it just to replace lenses in existing frames, but how much more than $200 could a lens-only order be?
Answer: just short of $400, including the eye exam, which was allegedly discounted through the Wegmans insurance.
Plus, that exam included a full pupil dilation, which was still much in effect when she semi-staggered home behind the wheel. I suggested she put the order on hold until we checked out other options, which she did. What she didn't do, and really couldn't, was go to work two hours later, since the dilation was still gorking her head.
I then went about my fun? WOW! day, accomplishing virtually nothing in 4.5 hours on the road, and as I was waiting for my 5:30 workout class to start, there was the Chicken, bugging me about not having cashed in yet. It gave a local number, so I called it to complain about the misleading nature of the pricing. The guy called back quickly, and actually said, it's pretty clear they can do that if you read the fine print.
That's an oxymoron if ever I heard one. They'll refund the $36 I paid for the "deal" if I want (coincidentally almost the same amount the optician offered Eleanor off their inflated price), but I'm going to give them one more blast of lawyering tomorrow before giving up. In any event, I will be insisting they return her existing glasses and the paid-for scrip, and then we'll see who out there can beat that absurd price.
----
Because Eleanor missed work, she also missed picking up two of her prescriptions, which ran down to her last pills on Monday and yesterday, respectively. She'd realized that imminence late last week, called her new doctor's office, which was very quick and helpful in taking down the request, but which basically told her there wouldn't be a signed document in to the pharmacy until yesterday.
Or, as it turned out, today. Before she left for Optical Heaven, she'd confirmed they had received them, she made do with half-doses and blind faith through this morning, and asked me to pick them up after I got back from Rochester and workout....
and they weren't ready. More waiting while they dispensed them. Turned out, they had three scrips ready: the two we knew were out, plus her cholesterol med, which the new docs had changed the dose on. I needed to be counseled about that, and about the BP med changing appearance (but nothing else). By the time I got home from all that, barely an hour ago, Eleanor was long asleep from this day of medical fun and I'm about ready to smack a bitch who tries to tell me we have the best health care in the world.
----
One final oddity in the middle of all this, which I will cheat and just reproduce from Facebook, where I posted it while waiting for the mortaring and pestling to go on:
Tonight's entry in the I Don't Wanna Know Department: passing a doctor (white-coated and wearing hospital ID) passing me going into the store just now and coming back, a minute later, with exactly one item: a 20-roll pack of Wegmans paper towels. I'd only have worried more if she'd been masked and gowned.
I only hope that, whatever she had to clean up, she had good glasses so she could see it all:P
Late this morning: As she's posted, Eleanor headed off for an eye exam and the likely replacement of her lenses. She wound up with dilated pupils and a massive pain in the ass.
Opticians are one of those fringes of the profession that don't get good coverage in most insurance plans, and thus need to rely on gimmicks to make them even relatively affordable. My drill earlier this year- slightly discounted exam and not-at-all-discounted frames and lenses- ran a bit over $300. Literally a day later, a Living Social deal arrived for a different provider that would have knocked 70 percent off that. I bought it, gave it to Emily, and she experienced grief of her own because the dealio place wouldn't accept her prior "outdated" prescription and the old one refused to update it without a full-price exam.
So last week, I sought out the deal ahead of time, and wound up with the one tied to a major McNewspaper chain:
Yeah, that one. It offered $200 of value at a three-shop local chain for 36 bucks. Eleanor went today; they'd already told her she couldn't use it just to replace lenses in existing frames, but how much more than $200 could a lens-only order be?
Answer: just short of $400, including the eye exam, which was allegedly discounted through the Wegmans insurance.
Plus, that exam included a full pupil dilation, which was still much in effect when she semi-staggered home behind the wheel. I suggested she put the order on hold until we checked out other options, which she did. What she didn't do, and really couldn't, was go to work two hours later, since the dilation was still gorking her head.
I then went about my fun? WOW! day, accomplishing virtually nothing in 4.5 hours on the road, and as I was waiting for my 5:30 workout class to start, there was the Chicken, bugging me about not having cashed in yet. It gave a local number, so I called it to complain about the misleading nature of the pricing. The guy called back quickly, and actually said, it's pretty clear they can do that if you read the fine print.
That's an oxymoron if ever I heard one. They'll refund the $36 I paid for the "deal" if I want (coincidentally almost the same amount the optician offered Eleanor off their inflated price), but I'm going to give them one more blast of lawyering tomorrow before giving up. In any event, I will be insisting they return her existing glasses and the paid-for scrip, and then we'll see who out there can beat that absurd price.
----
Because Eleanor missed work, she also missed picking up two of her prescriptions, which ran down to her last pills on Monday and yesterday, respectively. She'd realized that imminence late last week, called her new doctor's office, which was very quick and helpful in taking down the request, but which basically told her there wouldn't be a signed document in to the pharmacy until yesterday.
Or, as it turned out, today. Before she left for Optical Heaven, she'd confirmed they had received them, she made do with half-doses and blind faith through this morning, and asked me to pick them up after I got back from Rochester and workout....
and they weren't ready. More waiting while they dispensed them. Turned out, they had three scrips ready: the two we knew were out, plus her cholesterol med, which the new docs had changed the dose on. I needed to be counseled about that, and about the BP med changing appearance (but nothing else). By the time I got home from all that, barely an hour ago, Eleanor was long asleep from this day of medical fun and I'm about ready to smack a bitch who tries to tell me we have the best health care in the world.
----
One final oddity in the middle of all this, which I will cheat and just reproduce from Facebook, where I posted it while waiting for the mortaring and pestling to go on:
Tonight's entry in the I Don't Wanna Know Department: passing a doctor (white-coated and wearing hospital ID) passing me going into the store just now and coming back, a minute later, with exactly one item: a 20-roll pack of Wegmans paper towels. I'd only have worried more if she'd been masked and gowned.
I only hope that, whatever she had to clean up, she had good glasses so she could see it all:P
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no subject
Date: 2012-09-06 01:14 am (UTC)I'm about ready to smack a bitch who tries to tell me we have the best health care in the world.
no subject
Date: 2012-09-06 07:08 am (UTC)It's odd, everyone else has major problems with dilation, I don't. It might be because my eyes naturally dilate so far that I can't actually have laser surgery to fix my vision - apparently there's nothing to work with.
And I used to think the US had decent health care. Then I had to pay for my own. And then I moved to another country.
*sends hugs and wishes for a better day tomorrow*
no subject
Date: 2012-09-07 06:41 pm (UTC)