Am I legally obligated to pay for a medical bill? During an annual checkup, my doctor requested blood work to be done, he told me there would be no charge. I later received a bill for the blood work for an amount I never consented to. I was told it was because the health insurance company rejected the claim. Am I legal required to pay? What would be the consequences if I refuse to pay?
You probably don't have any legal recourse. I once got out of a dental bill by arguing along these lines: "you told me the cost would be X and you knew the terms of my insurance coverage when you provided that estimate, or at least you claimed you did, and I would not have consented had I known the cost would be Y instead of X. "In that case, however, the service was partially paid by the insurer; it was just less of a payment than the office has expected. Another option you have is to challenge the insurance company's denial of the claim. They may have denied it incorrectly. Look up the diagnosis codes and service codes on your bill and make sure they describe the visit accurately. Read your policy to see the terms of your coverage.
Suppose the shop bills you $2000 and you have a $750 deductible. You pay them $750, your insurance company pays $1250. Now suppose instead that the shop purports to waive the deductible. In order to get the insurance company to pay $1250 they still have to bill $2000. Then they don't collect the $750 from you. Presumably they write it off as bad debt. It smells like insurance fraud to me, on two counts: first, the shop expects to receive $1250 for a service but they produce a bill of $2000 for the insurance company's benefit and then do not seek payment from the insured party for any balance purportedly due beyond $1250. Second, the insured party has a contract with the insurer undertaking to pay the first $750 of the claim but has conspired with the shop to avoid paying that amount through deception. Had the shop played by the rules, they would have billed $1250 and the insurer would have paid $500. The shop isn't waiving your deductible; it's getting it out of the insurance company by fraud, with your collusion. Another way of handling this is that the auto body shop submits an estimate for the cost necessary to restore the car to a certain degree but then restores the car to a lesser degree. If everyone is aware that this is happening then it might be acceptable, depending on the terms of the insurance policy.
None because the principle is Freedom to contract There is a general right of any being (natural like a person or even a company) to contract with anyone. Buying someone's service is a contract. A contract forms when: They offer something You offer something Both sides agree on it. (meeting of the minds) It is totally legal for a company to make wears a mask in our place of business a part of either being admitted onto the property or agreeing to contract with you. Noncompliance means as a result that they don't agree to serve you and don't offer to you. In fact, they explicitly reject to contract with you unless you wear a mask, which is their right unless there is a law that would specifically make that reason illegal. There are laws that reduce the freedom of contract, such as the civil right act (protected classes, such as religion, race, sex and more), the Americans with disabilities act (demanding reasonable accommodation), and labor laws (outlawing labor practices or limiting the amount of work or minimum payment) as well as anti-discrimination laws (establishing further classes). However note, that laws need to be written in such a way that they don't discriminate against the company either! One case where freedom to contract was attacked using an anti-discrimination law was Masterpiece Cakeshop - which was decided on first amendment grounds based on the rights of the owner: the law can't force someone to make a product he would not support the message of. Currently, there might only be some ordinance that bans mask policies in Texas, but it is dubious if that might be even an enforceable order from the Texas governor - Especially since OSHA just made adjustments to standards and mandates on the federal level - which include adjustments to respiratory protection fields.
Yes You have a contract and, while I don't know what it says, its a fair bet that not making payments the contract requires you to make would be a breach of that contract. This would allow the other party to sue you for the unpaid fees as well as interest on them and the consts of collection (collection agency fees, legal fees etc.). In addition they can report you as a defaulter (which you would be) to any and all credit reporting agencies which would wreck your ability to get credit in the future. If the do sue you and succeed (as the probably would) they can seize your assets to sell them to recover their debt - since the time-share appears to have limited value they would probably seize your savings or your car instead. You need to read the contract to find out how you can end it legally.
A doctor can choose their patients A doctor has a professional duty to render aid in an emergency. However, apart from this and assuming the decision is not made for a prohibited or unlawfully discriminatory reason, they can refuse to see whoever they want. What you have here is poor customer relations, not illegally. Find a better doctor.
In Illinois: The General Assembly has established numerous protections for the generous and compassionate acts of its citizens who volunteer their time and talents to help others. Basically, if you are a licensed medical profession, or have had successful training in CPR provided by the the American Red Cross or the American Heart Association, and you try in good faith to save somebody's life and fail, you are not liable for their death, under the assumption you did not cause harm in the first place (i.e. you can not stab someone in the chest, attempt CPR, and be exempt from lawsuit(s)). Note that this doesn't apply to just CPR or physicians. This also covers dentists, Pharmacists, Optometrists, Physical Therapist, etc.
I assume that you arranged a contract with some company which paid the contractor the full amount, and not you have to pay that company. If you stop paying the finance company, they will initiate legal proceedings against you to make good on your obligation, and that won't affect what the contractor does. It might not hurt you to write a formal letter (no phone calls) to the contractor stating that you require them to complete the job by some date certain, and hope that you won't have to take the matter to court. If you decide to write the letter yourself, you want to avoid saying anything that could be held against your interest, for example "I don't care how crappy a job you do, I just want this job done!": you need to be sure that what you say in a letter does not put you at a legal disadvantage. The best way to guarantee that is to hire an attorney to write the letter. If you want your money back (plus interest), you will almost certainly need to hire an attorney to write the letter. It is possible that there is an arbitration clause in your contract, requiring you to settle disputes with the firm Dewey, Cheatham &amp; Howe. In that case, your attorney might not be able to do much for you. There cannot be a clause in a contract that penalizes you simply for hiring an attorney.
The solicitor is allowed not to accept a case. If your ex-wife asked him to prepare papers, and he feels that she is getting ripped off, it is absolutely understandable that he won't prepare these papers for her, because he doesn't want to be sued or badmouthed when the deal goes wrong. "We would also reserve the right to take our own professional advice as to our efforts on your behalf." means simply he is not specialised in some subject, and will prefer to ask someone who is. Like a medical doctor asking for a second opinion before going ahead and cutting your leg off. Now I would have preferred if the solicitor had said concretely what exactly is wrong with the contract. Also, it would be obvious that you would be very comfortable with anything that he would advice her against. If he thinks that it is a good deal for you but not for her, he should advice against it. (Your comment to another question seems to indicate that she should be paid a lot more than you offered, so her solicitor seems to have been perfectly right).