Legal Question in Credit and Debt Law in Pennsylvania

Why is this not legal? Disability does not excuse you from paying for medical services. Nor is the healthcare provider required to be the easy pay lender for you. If you want to make payments, charge the bill on a credit card or get a personal loan and repay the loan or credit card company.

If these are not options for you, there are a couple of options: (1) if you have a lot of dischargeable debts, consider filing bankruptcy. There are repercussions and depending on the kind of bankruptcy you file you will be precluded from getting a second bankruptcy discharge for 4 - 8 years in the future so if you will be incurring more debts, then don't file now. (2) Stop paying and let the health care provider turn you over to collections. Start saving the money you would be paying to the doctor and when you have at least 50% of the balance saved up, make an offer to resolve the debt at that time. Of course, there will be a delinquency on your credit. If you are not needing credit, then your credit report should not really be a concern.

There are no really good options here other than you paying the bill in full via a credit card or loan and making repayments to the lender. I know in NC there is a bill requiring health care providers to tell you before they turn a debt over to collections. There was a similar bill in Congress which didn't make it very far. I have not checked yet to see if Pennsylvania has a similar law, but even if they did, it would not stop the healthcare provider from eventually turning you over to collection for an unpaid bill.

While some things are unexpected, if you are on SSDI, you should qualify for Medicare and eligible to purchase, if you can afford it, a Medigap policy of supplemental insurance to protect yourself from bills. Unfortunately, the way the healthcare system is in the US at present, the policy seems to be "don't get sick and if you do get sick, die quick" so you don't rack up medical debts. Its either that or forego medical care or look for cheaper options for routine planned health care expenses.

Sorry.