I need to speak with someone about this bill

Here is a conversation I had yesterday between myself and the imaginary person I created in the billing department at Central Illinois Pathology.

Me: I need to speak with someone regarding an invoice I received.

Demon: Yes, do you have the invoice number, service date, and patient information?

Me: The service date was May 19th and 20th of this year and the patient's name was Isabelle Duffy.

Demon: Okay let me pull that up here.

..........Long pause...................................

Demon: Okay, I see the bill is past due. Are you calling to make payment arrangements?

Me: Well, I'm calling for the 3rd time to give you my insurance information so you can bill them. I gave it to the hospital where the services where administered and I have faxed it to you twice. I'm thinking at this point if I just verbally read you the numbers and hold while you file the claim we can get somewhere.

Demon: (insert slightly miffed tone) Well, we are going to have receive payment at some point because this bill is 3 months old.

Me: Well actually, while we're talking about that let me tell you what this bill is for. If you'll scroll down on your computer a little you'll see that these services were performed on a 21 day old infant. She was my daughter and we called her Izzy. You'll see that she wasn't a drug addict because your test revealed that as all good parents we didn't let her do drugs. You'll also see that in the first 35 tests they ran everything came back normal. Then you'll see a series of tests for rare blood disorders, and then you'll see nothing past May 20th because she died that day. And actually, now that I'm telling you this, I would like to inquire into your policy regarding customer service. Since I have received a bill from you for services rendered, that makes me a customer. Every single customer service based business I have ever dealt with has a customer satisfaction policy. I received a service from you with an outcome that I'm unsatisfied with. I think that's more than understandable.

Demon: .................silence......................................

Tomorrow I'll think I'll call the insurance company and inquire as to why they don't have someone there smart enough to notice that they are putting statements from her birth bills in the same envelope as statements from her death bills. Maybe they can also explain why they would question the necessity of the pediatric specialist charges in the ICU. Or why they are only partially paying the transportation charges. Do they really think we were like. "Oh hey, just for fun lets send her in the helicopter alone 90 minutes away. We'll be totally fine with that." I'll try to make them understand what it's like to see your 21 day old daughter on an adult sized stretcher being wheeled out to the heli-pad, and you can't go. And you're trying to feel better because both of the men transporting her have kids of their own, and one of them was a medic in Iraq, but you don't. Wish me luck.