This post comes from Jim Wang at partner blog Bargaineering.
If you have medical insurance, you should receive an "explanation of benefits" from your insurance company every time you visit a doctor.
Have you ever looked at one? It's amazing. You'll see how much the doctor billed you and how much the insurance company negotiated as an allowable rate. The difference can be staggering.
The catch-22 in all this is that if you don't have insurance, you'd have to pay the standard rate unless you negotiated with the doctor -- and negotiating with the white coat can be hard. Fortunately, it's not as uncommon as you think, according to a New York Times article.
Here are a few things you need to keep in mind as you approach this:
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