COLUMN: Insurance companies more mafia than claims

I used to think I was safe until I got involved with the mafia.

Sadly, like most good Italian stories, I didn’t mean to.

You see, it all started before I got married. I knew I was going to have to get insurance because my wife is extremely accident-prone and my father in law was adamant that I get insurance to pay for her annual hospital escapade. I think the real reason he pushed this so much is because he’s a doctor and as a member of the medical community he lives up to the fine print of the Hippocratic Oath, which says, “Thou shalt extort all the money humanely possible out of each patient treated.”

I didn’t figure getting insurance would be much of a problem. I would just pay a little bit of money each month and then when she went to the hospital, the insurance company would come to the rescue like Captain Planet and pay for it all. Quickly I learned insurance companies weren’t any sort of super hero but a bad reincarnation of Chicago mob bosses.

Back in the 20s, the hey day of modern crime, the mafia ruled supreme. They made the rules and enforced them. Slowly the police cracked down on organized crime and the ever-present mafia went into hiding.

With the mafia out of the way, a new breed of henchman arose: insurance companies. Sure organized crime is illegal but insurance companies have figured out a way to use mafia tactics and still make money.

Think about it. The mafia operates by convincing a person they are in grave danger (mostly from the mafia itself) and the only way to protect themselves is to buy protection from the mafia. When push comes to shove, the mafia doesn’t provide much protection and in the end they end up taking your blood.

Insurance companies operate much the same way.

For instance, I could be minding my own business, watching soccer and eating pizza, when a commercial breaks in with a seemingly life-and-death announcement. A serious looking doctor stands on screen explaining the hundreds of diseases out in the world, and how by calculating the relative position of the stars to Jupiter and the year you were born, you are most certainly going to catch one of these diseases.

I hurry and calculate my chances of getting a disease that sounds an awful lot like buyinsurancefromusordie, and come to the horrible realization that I am doomed. Within the next 23 years I will die of this disease. I drop the Cheeto I am about to put in my mouth and stare at the smug doctor, waiting for him to give me some glimmer of hope.

Sure enough, he has a solution: a protection plan where all I have to do is pay him a certain amount of money each month and when I become seriously ill, he will turn around and pay that money back to me in the form of pointless medical research that will never find a cure for my disease.

I figure it’s either do this or die so I go along and purchase this insurance.

This is when things get really confusing. Filling out insurance applications is more complicated than filing taxes. They want to know everything about you – your full name, social security number, drivers license number and how many times you’ve daydreamed in the middle of class. But I’m forced to fill it all out.

And that’s just the first line. It’s all downhill from there.

Question 1: Do you have a history of diabetes in your family? Yes.

Question 2: How many freckles do you have on the left side of your face? Are you serious? What do freckles have to do with health insurance? OK, I’ll answer it. I’m guessing 18.

Question 3: Does your pinky toe hurt right now? Well, yeah, but that’s because I stubbed my toe on the doorjamb when I went to the kitchen to get a bite to eat. Unfortunately there’s no place on the form to explain all this so I’m forced to answer yes, though I don’t fully understand the implications of this.

Question 4: How many times have you gone to the bathroom in the past 24 hours? Whoa, this is getting a bit too personal. I reluctantly put down seven, wishing desperately I could explain to them that I had pounded 64 ounces of Coke the night before to stay up while studying for a test. Somehow I get the feeling that they don’t care and this will count against me.

After wading through insurance questions for more than 12 hours, I finally finish and mail off an envelope so full of papers, it weighs more than an average chemistry textbook.

Two weeks later I get a call from the insurance company.

“Hello, iz dis Mr. Saeith ‘Awkins?” asks a woman sounding like she has taken only three weeks of English classes.

“Um, my name is Seth, but yes, you’re talking to him.”

“Dis iz (muffled guttural sounds that sounds something akin to Satan), from Your Soul Belongs To Us Insurance Company. On behalf of ze company, I’d vike to inform you zat you have passed ze preliminary screening process. Next ve vill send an agent to your home to do a medical exam.”

I’m a little scared at this point. I know what’s coming: a needle and really awkward, unappreciated touching by a nurse who has performed so many examines she sees you more as a piece of meat than a person.

Sure enough, Antonia arrives at the door and charges inside. She doesn’t smile, doesn’t blink and is packing heat. She drops her bag and pulls out a giant needle to draw my blood. She takes more than her fair share and doesn’t even leave a cookie for me. Talk about bad customer service.

A week later I get another phone call from the same lady as before and she informs me that the blood tests came clean but because of an initial misreading of the paperwork I sent in, I have been denied coverage. I ask why. She tells me because I went to the bathroom seven times in one day it was a sign of early cancer, which makes me a health liability and they do not want to cover me.

“But, let me explain, I drank too much the night before …”

“Oh, so you iz a drinker too?”

“No, that’s not what I meant. I just, never mind.”

So, after three weeks of aggravation I’m still not covered, have spent $30 on postage to mail the paperwork and they took my blood. I know deep down inside I need the protection but after being denied, I decide it’s not worth the trouble and save up money for when my wife takes her trip to the hospital.

Sounds like the mafia to me.

Seth Hawkins is a junior majoring in public relations. By day he’s a writer, by night he’s a sad little man that sits at home watching episodes of the Sopranos, wishing he was Italian. Questions and comments can be sent to him at seth.h@aggiemail.usu.edu