:( S.N.A.F.U.--More Medicaid Fun

Today I finally got the list of documents Medicaid requires in order to not cancel my children's insurance--cancel as a punishment, apparently, for my husband's being in the National Guard.  We went for many years--twelve and a half--without experiencing this even once, until he started basic training in January of 2009.  Immediately (only three or four days after he left) we were cancelled.  It happened again a few days after he left for his two summer weeks in 2010, and again (you guessed it) a few days after he left for his three summer weeks in Germany in 2011.  And now it's happened just the same way again this year.

I've spoken in another blog post of that January in 2009, when I had to try to convince Medicaid that my husband was not working in Oklahoma (where basic training was) while he was also working here in Indiana (where his civilian job was on hold until he came back).

My husband said maybe it's an annual thing.  But he doesn't have his summer service even near the same date every summer, and the basic training was in January.

I'm picturing one government official saying to another that they think it would be a good idea to cancel children's health insurance whenever the weather turns warm.  That sounds about as senseless as, "How dare he join the military?  We'll show him!"

The Medicaid people obviously know immediately whenever my husband changes jobs.  And the Social Security Administration knows exactly how much we all make (unless they screw it up like they did for me a few years back).  A lot of us down here in the below-the-poverty-limit trenches have wildly varying incomes, so I'm not even sure that a month's worth of pay stubs is the best possible indicator.  Our tax return, perhaps, would be better.  But it doesn't matter to us, personally.  Not this year.  Well, not any year.  I suppose when he got his National Guard bonus--that would have really messed things up if we'd had to convince them we didn't get paid that much every month. 

We only have two pay stubs to show them, and the military one is for pay we haven't even received yet.  We're a long way from being cancelled because of our income.

I would also kindly (or perhaps not so very kindly at this point) suggest giving people a much more generous deadline period.  Or they could just get the information from Social Security or the IRS, thereby bypassing the need for all those pesky deadlines, and for all that additional paperwork, and for all those pesky pay stubs that must be processed.

But I'm no expert--maybe there are good reasons to immediately gather pay stubs whenever anyone is ordered to report for military duty.  Anyway, it doesn't matter what I think.

So I gathered the information Medicaid asked for, beginning with my address, which prompted my third child, who at eleven is already smarter than many government officials, to wonder aloud how the paperwork managed to arrive at our house if they don't have that particular piece of information.  I copied all our Tricare cards, which we couldn't use without the Medicaid to cover deductibles and co-pays, and the last 30 days' pay stubs (except for the stub for this last week, which, understandably, has not yet been processed).  I filled out a few blanks, and signed my name at the bottom.

So far, so good.

Except....

There is no return address.

Not on the envelope.  Not on the form.  I looked.  So did my husband.

I just want to state, publicly and for the record, that I would never in my wildest dreams walk into a government office and start shooting people.  Just sayin'.



I will, as of Monday, have only six day left before the paperwork must have arrived (by mail) at their office.  It has to be there by Saturday.  Possibly Friday--I can't imagine them giving me a break just because the office will be closed on Saturday.  And now I will have to waste some of that precious time begging as many government agencies as I can find for that address.  Maybe I'll get lucky and one of them will respond Monday, and then I can mail the paperwork on Tuesday.  So far my luck hasn't been anything like that.

Did I mention that it takes that office several days once they get the paperwork to process it so that they know they have it?  Let me be clear--my documents don't count as having arrived on the day they arrived, they count as having arrived after they've been processed.  Yes, really.

I wrote my congressman again today.  All I can do is complain.  Lawyers aren't for people like us.  Neither is being treated with respect.