time is money

It seems that sometimes it's good to have a little extra time on my hands.  Last June I had hip replacement surgery which went very well. During the intervening months I have received bills for various parts of the surgery and hospital stay. These bills typically showed how much my insurance had paid and how much I owed.  They have sort of trickled in but nothing seemed unusual. Until, that is, three weeks ago, when, after several months, I suddenly got a bill for almost $500 and a notice that my payment was a month overdue.  I hate to admit it but in ordinary times I might have accepted the bill as accurate and paid it.  However, I've had a lot of time on my hands lately so I made some phone calls and willingly held as long as necessary to talk to real live people.  The pleasant lady in the hospital office explained that it was all the insurance company's fault.  They had changed their mind about covering a certain charge.  The contact person at the insurance company however seemed to think it was a problem with hospital billing. In both cases I was to to wait to pay the bill and they would look into it.  Evidently they had time too, because today I got a revised bill and the charge is now $37.  So much better. One more silver lining to staying in.