Kaiser Permanente Consumer Reviews - Page 5

DENVER, COLORADO -- During the entire process of labor, delivery, and post-delivery checkups no one from Kaiser thought to inform my wife and I that we only had 30 days from the birth of my first child to sign him up for his own insurance account. As this was our first child, we were uninformed of this process and assumed that he was covered under his mother's insurance. Now Kaiser has told us that our baby can't get insurance until January because we are past the 30 day limit that they never told us about.

DENVER, COLORADO -- I don't need to elaborate on it. Let me just say this:

I pay $4,200 a year... and when a visit doctor I still have to pay the full amount of the doctor fees, which runs around $300. Absolutely outrageous and criminal.

T

DENVER, COLORADO -- I've been with Kaiser for about three years because of its relative affordability in the healthcare marketplace. Kaiser is competent when it comes to routine, mechanical, procedural healthcare operations, such as prescribing drugs or taking labs. Kaiser utterly fails, however, when it comes to treating illness and caring for its patients. Kaiser doctors are brainwashed to serve the money machine and patients suffer as a result. If you are with Kaiser and you have any real illness, God help you because Kaiser sure as hell won't.

SILVER SPRING, MARYLAND -- Worst health care service. Doctors are competent but not enough available. I've been a customer for years but it takes at least 2 weeks to see my primary care physician and 3 months to see my specialist.

STOCKTON, CALIFORNIA -- My foot doctor, dr ** told me I needed foot surgery. I have arthritis on the foot. I did have the surgery. The corner bone did not fuse. I saw another kaiser foot specialist. He said I should have never had had foot surgery because the bone never fuses on the corner. I asked him why dr ** did that surgery, he said he did not know. I believe they experiment with people's bodies. I still have pain on the foot. Kaiser has the worst doctors ever.

SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA -- Kaiser mishandled my father's last week of life and the process leading up to this. They violated their pain management care claim as stated in their handbook which is basically false advertising and misrepresentation of what actually goes on once inside chaotic Kaiser care. My father suffered a very painful death all because of their lack of urgency, lack of prescribing the correct pain medication and many other incidences that were not monitored by my father's oncologist and medical team. Once on hospice the hospice nurses were negligent in effectively monitoring my father's pain and he basically was bleeding to death from his rectum.

At one point I called "**" on Santa Teresa hospital's supervisor line. ** said that he could not get a hospice nurse out to see my father for another 3 hours. This is while my father lay there bleeding profusely in pain. It took a call to my father's attorney and a threat to sue for Kaiser to get a hospice nurse to my father sooner and to get him situated and prepared to die with dignity. Should people have to do this to get healthcare staff to do their jobs?

Next, my brother also was recently diagnosed with colon cancer and wanted specific information about his upcoming surgery. Kaiser states this and on Dr. **'s (his former surgeon's) website he clearly states how he likes to ease the comfort of his patients as surgery can be a daunting experience. Dr. ** had misread my brother's chart on more than one occasion, and later with specifics about the surgery. This was a concern so more questions were asked of this Dr. to ease my brother's mind about the procedure. After a few hours Dr. ** called my brother stating it be best that he have another surgeon perform this procedure.

What kind of doctor doesn't have the integrity to finish what he started? What a loser to just walk away at the last minute when he is just being asked to do his job and ease the patient's mind for an upcoming procedure. Providing more information is too much sweat off of **'s brow? ** is clearly Wrong just as my father's oncologist Dr. ** was wrong. Fascinating how the names connect so well with these experiences. It's easy to make jokes of the care or lack of, at Kaiser. They must take the rejects from more reputable healthcare groups.

I don't have Kaiser and I will not lower myself to a place which operates below standard. I am fortunate I have a choice. I will surely stand up for family and friends who have Kaiser. They are easy to outsmart and not very bright, and quite irresponsible to just name a few.... and these are their good qualities.

I called Kaiser Permanente Membership Services regarding a contract change which was extremely time-sensitive. Translation: I had only a day or two to ensure some contract changes that would save me some money on my sky-high monthly independent-contractor health care dues. One more translation: I am a little old nanny, and what I pay in monthly fees could feed a small nation. Okay - more like a village.

I called the # offered. After a 22-minute wait (love that Muzak!) the bored Kaiser-person said I needed to call another #. Long story short but not so sweet, I was on the phone for most of an afternoon, being transferred from here to there to some planet far, far away, and nothing was resolved.

I decided to take an (unpaid) morning off of work to venture a trip to the Kaiser headquarters in Rockville, Maryland. When I arrived, it became clear where all that money hundreds of thousands of us send monthly is going. The place is castle-like in size and appearance; fortress-like in security. A security guard informed me that I was not allowed to go up the winding staircase to the membership offices to request help. Would he deliver a letter to them? No, not allowed. It seems he was not authorized to leave his post.

"Did I come to the CIA instead of Kaiser?" I asked. No reply. Not authorized to joke, I guess. I was told to wait, and a Kaiser representative would be down to talk to me. I waited. And waited. It was better than being on the phone, because I got a break from that damn music.

The upshot: I left. I had reached my humiliation quota for the day. On my ride home, all I could think of was all the money I have sent them throughout the years. And how a good customer like myself is treated. And deep regret that because our health care system is so unfair, an honest working person should be subjected to this kind of treatment. And deep compassion for all the other Kaiser Permanente customers who share my frustration and disillusionment.

UNION CITY, CALIFORNIA -- I own a business and recently switched to Kaiser for me and my employees' medical insurance. These are a few of the things that happened in the first one month that had me regret my decision to move to Kaiser:

1. Kaiser did not send any information about how to access account to the members. I, the group admin, had to send multiple emails to get the membership id information. However, when it came to billing, the first month premium was immediately charged to my account. The members were not able to avail any healthcare services for one month because they did not have any clue about how to take an appointment with the doctors.

2. There is no way to contact them outside business hours, not even to make payments! There is just one phone number for customer support and that too has very restrictive hours which makes it hard for someone with a full-time job.

3. I did not get any information about how to set up account for online access. Neither did I get information about how and where to send payments.

4. The notification of the first bill came on two days after the bill was due! How is anyone supposed to know that the bill is already due if the notification comes later than the due date?

5. There is no way to reset password online for group administrators. You can't even check for email responses without logging in! This is too much restriction in the name of security. This is so ironic because when I called an operator reset my password and told me the password over phone! What kind of security is this when you can't reset my password online and a live person can just speak out the password over the phone!

6. The website is really very difficult to use. The navigation controls are tedious and non-intuitive. It is very slow and does not provide information about how to pay bills. I hope this review helps you make decision on choosing the right medical insurance plan.

MENLO PARK, CALIFORNIA -- I applied for Kaiser's health insurance at the beginning of January 2009 with the intention of starting health coverage at the beginning of March, however now I don't believe that this will happen.

I wasn't very happy when I found out that I needed to fill in a 20 page health questionnaire when I started the application process online, especially since I had never had to do one with Blue Cross, but I pushed through it anyway. I finally got to the Women's health section of the application where they asked when was your last period. Since I am on Depo (birth control shot who's side effect is stopping a woman's period) I answered truthfully with September 2003. Of course this pulled up all kinds of red flag warnings on the site, it then asked me why which of course I answered with "taking Depo".

I didn't hear anything from Kaiser for almost a month and when I went to check my application status online it just said 'processing'. I finally received a phone call from someone at Kaiser (9:00 at night) asking me, once again, when my last period was and what medication/birth control I was on. Finally I received a letter from them, basically implying that they didn't trust me and that I would have to go down to one of their lab facilities and take a pregnancy test, before they would consider my application.

Oh and they apparently only gave me two weeks to complete this from the date that the letter was written (one week and one day from when the letter was actually delivered) or they would figure that I was pregnant and they would throw away me application.

My anguish is over the fact that if they were actually medical professionals then they would know that one of the side effects of taking Depo is that you do not receive your period and that if I had been pregnant since September 2003...I would be DEAD (with a 5 year old inside)! Even after I take this pregnancy test, they can still deny me...a perfectly healthy 25 year old with no prior medical problems...WTF? Just because I am on birth control? If you apply to Kaiser just know that you might be in for a very long, hassled time!

PANORAMA CITY VOLUNTEER, CALIFORNIA -- Deplorable treatment of senior volunteer- "bullying"€ humiliation, Oct 17, 2011. Panorama City pharmacy n3. Sorry for this contact but hopeful of resolution. This situation has no dignity or values of KP and surely embarrasses all of KP I wish to bring to your attention, numerous deplorable acts on me as a 4 year senior volunteer at Panorama City Facility. Especially arrogant attitude of managers to act equally for justice and to ascertain factual accounts and base a decision on the merit of the complaint or the employee'€™s action.

In order to capsulize these events: I was set upon by **, in pharmacy 3 n she followed and antagonized me in three separate instances and "screamed" in my face. Finally, she tracked me from the supply room where she pushed a cart into the shelves near me as I removed an eyelash clouding my vision and did the same while I read the bulletin board and finally to the other side of the pharmacy approximately 30-35 feet. She actually pursued me. She screamedtype that she lurched forward at me and lowly screamed in my face. ”She was trying to bait me into a fight with contact but I disappointed her--sounds odd but it's 100% true--just not audible throughout the room.

Security cameras!! In addition I was in resource management and at least 6 rn€™s can vouch for my demeanor and even improvements, I made several suggestions that resulted in better archived files, more functional meeting room and accuracy of work file and pick up point for tasks for me.

Evening vol dir allowed a tottering older woman to have her personal dog at a KP Banquet where capacity was overflowing with over 500-600 peoplethe woman even tripped and fell into the carving station this is the kind of bias and mindless decisions that permeate KPunless you are chosen- why bother you with such trivia€. Well to illustrate the culture of arrogance that even includes managers, employees and gender baiting all sources have been exhausted. There are no scruples of KP that KP can be proud of in this activity.

I thought KP had a policy of non€“ retaliation and fairness. €It is not being exhibited to show you this. I stated that I would prefer to have the door open in the resources office as it has been for over 3 years. €”I was thoroughly screeched at by one of your director/a manager practically slammed the door. KP is so blind to old volunteers as to miss this implicationof course you get itsuppose a young woman said that, what should the manager have done? Enough my focus is on **'€™s cohort€™s aggressive and erratic/belligerent behavior in pharmacy n3. Respectfully submitted for your consideration. Please by June 1 2012, appreciate it.