'My bill was paid in full': Clever hospital patient uses logic and sarcasm to pay for his astronomical health insurance bill

Jesse Kessenheimer • Writer and Editor

Jul 31, 2023 10:00 AM EDT

Anyone who's urgently ordered an Uber while they're going into anaphylactic shock can attest that it's not an ideal situation to have to call an ambulance. For some, the ambulance is just too dang expensive and I certainly can't blame them! Unless you're hopping in an emergency vehicle that's covered by your insurance, it's possible that you'd be better off calling a Lyft. But in this case, one man actually caved to the heat of emergency health pressures, calling an ambulance (that he thought was in-network) when he was having a health emergency.

Thinking he was covered by insurance, the man was shocked and horrified when he received an astronomical bill from his insurance company. Upon calling them to sort things out, he learned that the only in-network emergency transport vehicle within 150 miles of his home was… drumroll please… a helicopter. Hmm, so would it have been better for him to give his local Heli-transport a call while he was simply needing an Epipen and a Benadryl? The insurance company was the judge of that and as it turns out, they're not as strict as you think they'd be when faced with a very angry customer.

Scroll for the full story on how one man stuck it to the system with one simple phone call, using logic, cleverness, and a dash of sarcasm to bring his health insurance company to their knees. For more system hacks, check out this tale of an IT professional that applies for his own job under an alias so he can make double the salary doing the same work.