In an effort to recoup $1.38 million in a time of budget shortfall, Hudson Health Center could start billing student's health insurance companies. The move seems to be without any drawbacks. Not only would billing insurance companies help Ohio University's dismal finances, it could result in Hudson being able to provide better services for students. And students would see very little, if any, cost increase because they would only have to put down minimal co-pays while their insurance companies covered the larger bill.
The only question is, Why weren't insurance companies billed in the first place? OU's current system, which is similar to many large public universities including Ohio State, is that all students must have health insurance, either through OU or through a private company. The problem is that those insured through private companies never saw any bills, nor did their insurers. Kent Smith, the vice president for student affairs, said OU didn't have the manpower to bill several different insurance companies. It must have been cheaper to simply raid the student general fee, from which Student Health Services draws 65 percent of its funding.
The manpower argument is preposterous. If billing insurance companies could have saved $1.38 million, some of that money could have been used to hire additional manpower for a notoriously under-funded area of the university.
No matter how you look at it, the services at Hudson cost money. Even if it is funded out of the general fee, the money comes from somewhere. Hudson should start acting more like a professional doctor's office, where patients and their insurance companies pay for the cost of their own care. That way students who don't get sick won't be paying for those who do through the general fee.
University officials are right to start billing students' insurance companies. But they should have been doing so a long time ago.Editorials represent the majority opinion of the Post executive editors.
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subhed: Hudson should charge insurance companies to relieve reliance on studentsG
