Okay, so this is a weird kind of diary for me, but I was talking to a friend today. He’s been trying to get a hearing aid for about four months. It’s medically necessary, due to the acoustic neuroma he had a few years ago. Basically, he had what practically amounts to brain surgery and this hearing aid is kind of the last step in his recovery.
Anyway, he looked and found out his insurance would pay for this medically necessary device. Thing is, he’s covered by two insurances, one from his company and the other from his wife’s insurance, which is better. She works for the VA. Two insurances makes billing office personnel confused sometimes.
Okay, now I’ll just take a moment to recognize that most people in this country, and probably most people reading here, don’t have the kind of insurance my friend has. I certainly don’t. But I hope you don’t begrudge him. He’s a Black man in Florida who’s worked for the same organization for over 30 years, his wife’s a Black woman in Florida who’s worked for shit wages and raised kids for over 30 years, and both have taken all the shit that you can imagine and more. He’s still managed to keep his cool and be in a supervisory position. If he were white, he’d probably be in upper management.
Back to the story. I’ll try to make this short. My friend had the hearing aid all lined up, and then about a month ago he was informed that he would have to pay $700 to get it. He called the people who informed him of that and said, “No, that’s wrong. I already checked. My insurance covers it.”
They were all like, “Oh, I’m confused.”
Flash forward to today. The hearing aid people called him and were all like, “Hey, we really want you to get this hearing aid and it’s only $700.”
He was all like, “Y’all haven’t even yet tried to figure out this insurance situation, which isn’t that complicated.” To be clear, he was all like that internally, but what he said to them was, “I’m going on vacation next week, and I just don’t want to get angry right now.”
They were all like, “But don’t you want this hearing aid that will help you so much? It’s only $700.” They didn’t mention that they were under the gun to resolve this without putting in the effort to figure out the insurance situation that they should have figured out a month ago.
He was all like, “Nah, I’ve told you what I have to tell you, and I’m going on vacation next week, and I don’t want to be angry right now.”
So now they’re all freaked that they’re not gonna get the sale, and he’s all like, “Hey, what’s another few weeks?”
Like I said, this is a weird diary. But I find wisdom in the way my friend handled this situation.
I’m going on vacation next week, and I don’t want to be angry.
Those are words to live by.