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I work for a national, $600 yearly deductible and 15-30 copay

Posted By: national MT on 2006-03-13
In Reply to: Anyone have copay insurance through a national... - (sm)

nm


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Husband's plan has no deductible, just copay and pays just straight up to 12 visits a year.

I do have a high deductible for mine, I think $5000 but the important thing to me is that I only pay $35 office visit copay. The deductible only kicks in on lab, x-ray etc.. and I have prescription coverage. The other thing you have to consider, as I also work in a physician's office doing medical billing, is that there are substantial contractual adjustments if you are with a BC plan. Say, your bill is $100 and the "allowable" from the insurance company is $75, that means that your doctor's office has to adjust off the extra $25 and you are not responsible for that; whereas, if you had no insurance, you'd have to pay the whole $100 out of your own pocket, no discount there.


Anyone have copay insurance through a national...
out there anymore or are there only outrageous deductibles left to be found???  I sure miss the old days of $15-$30 for an office visit...insurance is just rediculous anymore!
(1) Don't work for a national. (2) Don't work for a national. (3) Don't work for a nation

If you still want to stay in MTing, which is a dying job, go to a hospital and apply to do radiology.  They sometimes hire people just out of transcription schools.


But don't work at home thinking you will make any money at all - even with 20 years of experience - the nationals have wrecked that. 


Be under the umbrella of protection at a hospital.  That way when your computer breaks, the weather is bad, you are sick, there is no work - you will not be without a paycheck. 


The nationals are selling a line of BULL.  Gradually they have taken what used to be our built-it benefits------------> and moved it over to their pockets and called it their PROFIT.  They are not brilliant - but they are unethical thieves.



I work for a national
and I have a ton of doctors (clinic and hospital).  I type 1000 lines in 3 to 4  hours.  I don't have a lot of normals.  There are some but don't use them on a daily basis.  I just put my nose to the grind stone and make myself sit there for a certain amount of reports before I let myself get up.  It can be done.
do you work for a national?
Then why do you work for them if they are a bunch of crooks stealing from you?  That is the only alternative to my theory, if they do not offer benefits, make you test even when you are seasoned, do not give raises, with no good reason other than they are greedy thieves?  It doesn't make sense to me. 
no. work for a national. nm
x
Currently work for a national

and all I currently know about the ENT office is that they have some system in place currently in-office that the doctors dictate into using a phone.  Their work is currently done in-house by 1 full-time MT who is retiring and 1 p.r.n. MT.  I currently use high-speed (cable) internet but might possibly be soon moving to a location that would only have satellite for high-speed (or dial up).


When you take on too much work. Getting 2 PT job offers plus have FT with national (sm)

Two local doctors offering me 2-3 hours per day each, plus the FT (about 6 actual hours of typing a day) with a national. 


One doctor is orthopedic, the other vascular surgeon (H&Ps in office).  One is a mumbler, the other has a lisp.  The national job is radiology (fairly easy - would be faster if I could master IT, though).


What should I do?  Am afraid I will take on more than I can handle and at same time, refuse a job that I later will regret.  I need the money, needless to say.  Anyone ever face this? 


Well, I work for a national, but my account
is a big hospital, doing acute work. It was a heck of a way to learn starting off, but I know it will benefit me in the long run, just one of those days!

Closing in on my 2 years now, I thought about maybe applying at a hospital inhouse here that hires starting out at $20, but once you add all the expenses (not counting any deductions), you come out to about the same. It's just not worth it. It would probably be less stress considering I would work set hours instead of all the crazy ones I have been doing, but then you have to add in at least 2 hours of drive time to that each day. It evens all out I suppose.
I average $32,000. I work for a National. nm
xxx
also, I work for a national - not my own clients! nm
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Has anyone asked for a raise lately? How do you go about it? Work for a national and have not
increase for five years.  Just pumped some gas and realize my cost of living is going up but my pay is stagnant.  How do you go about asking for a raise?
Don't work for a national. Find a small
MTSO that pays well. They are out there, as long as you hold up your end of the bargin. I left my hospital job to work for a national, several nationals now but who is counting. I found a small company and finally am making the $$$.

Good luck to you.
Why do you say $20/hr? I work for a national, and at 11 cpl, 300 lines per hour, sm

that's $33/hour.  I'm not driving a Lexus or anything, but I'm comfortable.  Generally speaking, find a mid-sized national, big enough to have enough work for you all of the time, yet small enough to care and realize that quality work deserves quality pay.


They are out there.  Good luck!


Our hospital laid us all off and I went to work for the national that got the bid. nm
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Yes, midsize national. Low work. Overhiring. nm
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The national I work for has a no blank policy. sm
Plus you have to have 90% no blanks to QA to get bonuses and to maintain full-time status. This is very hard sometimes with some of the dictators that dictate from across the room, while the ward is going ape, and this all right next to the telemetry monitor and the ringing phone or at home with the yapping dogs in the background.

But I have found our QA to be forgiving and understanding, so I am getting more comfortable. I think they have a high standard so we will step higher, but they understand the reality, which I think is good.

DH says he definitely would not go through what I go through to be sure there are no blanks, but I am hoping that in time it will get easier, and I will get more productive, and I think it is.

I work for a national, and we're allowed
.
Question: If you work for national that provides computer,
can you ask their Tech support to move their files onto the laptop computer?

One other question: If you are required to have HSI connection for dictation and files, do you have access to that and how?
I'll bet I work for the same national! While I have great dictators, seriously they never say the
same thinge twice, save one surgeon who always ends his op reports with the same paragraph, which, of course, I have in my expander.  I mean it - there are probably 30 doctors, and I never ever get a repeat or any pattern at all! Again, I have a huge expander that I've set up on my own over the years, and rarely type more than a few words "longhand", but I still am not hitting over 200-250 lines an hour.  Oh well! At least I have great dictators, right? 
when you work for a national, you sign a confidentiality agreement...?
the same rules would apply, and you must have signed a confidentiality agreement with whomever you work for. you can be fired, if breached.

my opinion, as a professional, you transcribe it and mums the word...

when I worked in a hospital, someone was caught 'sharing' information about the CEO from a transcription report, and was fired on the spot.
Actually, it is quite easy to skip jobs, and I work for a national. sm

Depending upon the account, just press the appropriate number on the C-phone, and *poof* you're at the next job.  In my case, I have no "proof" per se, but when jobs skip from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. then to 1 p.m., etc., and then it gets back to "normal" when you get to the non-ESL docs where I guess they stopped working.  it's not too hard to figure out that someone took what they wanted and left the rest.  It doesn't matter to me.  As has been stated, the MT who cherrypicks cheats himself/herself out of the chance to master everything and assure himself/herself of a larger pool of work.  That goes also for those who limit themselves to only certain work types.  Sure, we all have our preferences (I prefer admit notes and consults), but if you can do everything, then you're more likely not to be one of the ones coming here complaining of no work.


Just my opinion, and you know we all have one.  Happy Friday the 13th!   I have the weekend off for once, and it is actually beautiful weather here.  Yippee! 


How do you do 2000 a day? Do you work for a national or small company? nm

nm


If you work for a national, what difference does it make where you live?
If you work locally, then yes I think it makes a difference. I work for a national, live in the boondocks and still do well.
The one national that I am aware of, employees would be thrilled to work just 8 hours a day. They

:)


Can a national require full time MTs to work overtime?

?


I don't work for one of the larger nationals, but a good-sized national and

in 5 years the hospital system has been down twice and my company wasn't able to pull work and the company's system was down once for a hurricane and once the power was out for part of a day.   I never went a full day without work.


I think maybe some of the nationals are poorly managed and they use "server down" as an excuse for no work.  For a company that depends on their servers for their livelihood I don't believe they actually have the much down time.  I don't think most companies pay for downtime. 


 


Oh, bull. I'm with a large national and those clients whose work is offshored
That one statement is bunk.

I work for a national. Most of the time the voices are pretty good, but

I have been getting some of late that have background noices, door slamming, people talking,  Sometimes the doc will stop talking but the noices sound so close to him that it is annoying.  Do you think the sound card would interfere with my company's computer?  It sounds nice to have even though it does not help the background stuff.   I guess that is a good question for tech.  Thanks again! 


I have 2 clinics still on tapes, love'em! Also work for a national. Like that too. nm
nm
The midsize national I work for has a nice tiered incentive plan sm
for employees, not sure about the ICs.  In order not to qualify for one of the incentives, you'd have to transcribe at LESS than 150 LPH.  Pretty easy to make bonus each pay period.  The faster you are, the bigger the bonus.
I didnt ask for ANYTHING. Merry Christmas and watch your back when u work for a national.
thats MY point.
Been at home for over a year now and I switched to night shift. I work for a national. Started out
working the night shift and sleeping in shifts during the day. My kids are way older but that doesn't mean they don't interrupt me. Besides, there the phone issue, more interruptions, the dogs bothered me a lot, too. Love them dearly but, oh so spoiled. It was taking me 10 hours to do what I can do in 8 on nights, plus I manage to get more sleep, if you can believe that. I still get supper on the table, vacuum, laundry, etc. So far it is working pretty good, so I think I will put in for permanent night hours for awhile. No sense in working 10 when I can work 8.
The national I work for usually offers jobs to the in-house people when they acquire an account. nm
nm
A small national is a national company that is smaller
than a big national.  There are a few "big" nationals, where they have hundreds, if not thousands of employees.   I work for what I call a small national, only has about 30 employees.    An MTSO could also be considered a small national. 
I have 5,000 deductible

It's more or less catastrophic insurance, however, when I was formerly covered on my job there was a fairly high deductible also.  Anyway, I am 53 years old and my premium is 120.00 a month.  It's through Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield.  You can bring up lots of insurance information via the internet that does comparisons of different plans and costs based on your age.


Only 50%, 1/2 of SS is deductible
You only deduct 50% of your SS as you are paying that much.  Look at your 1040, deudction is 50% of what you paid on your net income on scheudle C. 
Tax Deductible Expenses
We ran a business for years from our home.  As far as I know, you can take the base rate of your telephone bill as an expense (which includes FCC taxes) and any long distance calls related directly to the business.  As for Home Owners Insurance, you can take 7% of the insurance because you use 7% of your home for your business.  Also, anything related to the business such as equipment, paper, tapes or special software programs can be taken as well.  If you have to travel to deliver the finished reports, I believe the rate is 28 cents a mile.  If you travel, you can also deduct any maintenance on your vehicle.   Hope this helps. 
IMO no, trip is not tax deductible at all. (nm)
x
Only way trip is deductible is if it is
Like if you are going to an MT seminar or traveling to meet a new client, etc. Working while on vacation doesn't count since you aren't required to work from that location.

When it IS business related, you have to have receipts and legitimate paperwork proving it is work related and that you spent time conducting business. A trip expense like that would be a red flag to the IRS to audit you, so you darn well better have excellent documentation.
I went from national to small back to national
My large national has all the resources and money to operate successfully and have decent platform, etc., to work on, the small company did not, and I went back to the national.
Taxes are deductible and it does help out at the end of the year.
Be sure to try to get fixed. I have 7.5 fixed for 30. They do have 40 yr mtgs now. And you can always refinance if your financial picture changes. When I moved into my home, i had no cable, a junky car and ate like a poor person. Once, to make my mtg, during a really rough time, i sold my bedroom suite. Keeping the roof over our heads is #1 priority. You sound like someone responsible enough to do this. Would you qualify for this loan on your own? Getting his name on this house might not be smart thing to do during these rocky times?
and don't forget the other 7.5% is deductible off of your income nm
nm
you have it backwards, if you don't go to the doc get a high deductible
having a high deductible will really cut down on your premiums. Say you rarely see the doctor and don't have prescriptions. An 80/20 plan with a $5000 deductible can run you as little as $59 a month, and that has a $500 out of pocket. I have Assurant Health (formerly Fortis), for myself and the kids. For $5000 family deductible we pay about $3000. So the most we will pay in a year is $8000. But at my husband's last job, we were supposed to pay all of the premium for family coverage and they would pay for his coverage. Premiums were going to be $9000. Add a $500 deductible to that and 20% which would probably run another $2000, and a catastrophic illness for one person would be $11,500. $11500 is a lot more than $8000, plus with the Assurant Health plan that is our FAMILY deductible. With the group plan, if one more person got sick, it started all over again with their own deductible. So you have to do the math.  Individual coverage for all 4 of us will run us $5300/yr, that is, if they agree to insure my husband. If you have ANYTHING at all, individual insurance will not take you. So keep that in mind too. Insurance is the reason why somebody in the family should have a "real" job :)
depends on age, health, deductible, etc
Too many variables but figure on $350 to $500 depending on the above.  All you have to do is do a search on medical insurance coverage in your area and find out. 
only one office is deductible -- color coding

I use color coding and have done so from day 1.  Have 7 docs and they all have their own color for tapes, letter head, returned dictation, binder etc.   They are no longer names, they are blue/green/yellow/red/purple/clear and yellow/green.  That is the only way I keep their things separate and for sure know who to deliver to what.   Am of the old school and this works for me.   Also have a monthly board that I keep track of their tapes and time off and that is also color coded. 


Only one office is deductible otherwise you could call your entire home an office. 



 


If you can get it, do an individual account with a high deductible...sm
but in order to get individual insurance, you have to have NO medical problems. They even put a rider on my son's ADD. Premiums for me and my two kids (husband has ins through work) run about $3800 a year, and we have a $5000 family deductible. Worse case scenario, some one gets sick and it costs us $8800. Premiums for family ins through DH's work were $9000 - sick or not. Good luck. I agree - the insurance lobbied that sucker through.
home office expenses are still deductible if you are an employee - nm
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Rules state anything not reimbursed by employer deductible.
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I pay yearly.
I always pay yearly. I have worked as an IC for 10 years. I have never had a penalty. A family member also has worked from home for over 20 years and has never paid quarterly. Just pay on April 15th and you should be fine.


They don't do yearly updates and never have. If you must
get hysterical about something at least get the real information about what you are carrying on about. Statements like this just make folks dismiss what you are saying because you don't know what you are talking about.