Medical insurance problem. Help!

Today’s blog is a plea to any Germans/expats living in Germany who might be able to help with a medical insurance issue we are having.

Our daughter was born on January 20^th and a few days after she was born, she had to spend a few days in the Uni Klinik. We received and paid the bill totaling almost 3000 Euros. Obviously both my husband and I are medically insured and therefore by default our daughter is/should be for this time. Yet currently all our insurance companies are refusing to pay. Who is responsible and who should foot the bill?

I am insured with a “gesetzliche Krankenversicherung” (law-enforced national  health insurance),  and my husband is privately insured. In Germany, if one of the parents is privately insured, any children also have to be. We therefore took out a private insurance for our daughter with a private insurance company where I have a so-called “Zusatzversicherung” (private supplementary insurance).I understood as long as you did this within two months of the child being born, your child is covered at all times from birth. The insurance company, however, would only insure her from February 1^st, thus conventiently missing those crucial days in between and a bill of thousands of Euros! We could, of course, have insured her automatically with my husband, but he has had a lot of problems with his insurance company, so we chose not to.

We sent the bill to all three insurance companies, but so far all three are refusing to pay.

If anyone has any experience with this or any idea what to do next, please get in touch!

Monday morning blues

My Monday morning actually started well; we all slept until 8am and my toddler willingly let me dress her and she ate her muesli and drank her milk with no fuss.

Then it all went horribly wrong. I made the mistake of letting my toddler watch some cartoons as bribery for getting her to the bathroom to brush her teeth and to keep the peace while dealing with a sick, snotty, crying baby. Toddler then of course refused to turn off said cartoons and howled as I put her shoes and jacket on to go downstairs to the car.

It was bucketing down with rain outside. Yes, it’s May and it’s still raining. My rain jacket was in the car. I struggled down three flights of stairs; crying baby in one arm and stroppy toddler in the other, refusing to walk, because her sister was being carried. We made a mad dash for the car, but we all still got soaking wet.

Screaming baby and sulky toddler in the back, I then hit the motorway just in time for rush hour; traffic was heavy and people drive oh so very badly in the pouring rain. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Radio Regenbogen announced that the RNV (transport network) here in Heidelberg was striking today, so there was a huge traffic jam to enter Heidelberg.

At this point, running late for both nursery drop off and the doctor’s appointment for sick baby afterwards, I finally arrived outside the nursery to find no parking. Thank you very much striking bus drivers and rain. I parked what seemed like miles away and yet again, my toddler refused to walk. Toddler in one arm, heavy car seat and baby in other, we walked to nursery in the pouring rain.  Toddler then conveniently decided she didn’t want to go to nursery today and refused to enter. After some more kicking and screaming, I eventually coaxed her in and sick, screaming baby and I braved the rain again and drove to the doctor’s.

My Monday morning blues continued. There was no parking outside the doctor’s surgery. We entered the underground parking and had to drive right down to the bottom floor to find a place. We headed for the lift. The lift was broken. I climbed another three flights of stairs and finally made it to the doctor’s surgery where I had to immediately perform an emergency feed and nappy change. The diagnosis: poor sick baby has a double ear infection and two perforated ear drums.

Here’s hoping for a better afternoon!