“Remoted” Day 278 (Saturday)

Success! After rescheduling my eye exam at least three times, I finally got myself into the office. The original appointment was scheduled for some point in the earlier days of quarantine guidelines. It wasn’t in my calendar and there was never a reminder sent, but an email over the summer declared “We’re sorry we missed you.” It was confusing, because I wasn't aware of an appointment, but at least it put it on my radar. Unfortunately, the summer email was not saved for reference and later, I couldn’t remember the name of the office (which had been visited only once). 

Finally, another email arrived that read, “It’s been 17 months since we last saw you,” and I was reminded who my new eye doctor is. The site was visited and the inline scheduling feature used. The same scheduling feature allows for changing appointments, which was used several times because it’s much easier to change an appointment when it isn’t required to speak to anyone. The hard part is the system doesn't allow for a cancellation, just a reschedule, which is probably smart on their end. My most recent delay was because the new travel and quarantine restrictions went into effect, and my eye doctor is located just over the state line in Nashua. 

Online appointment scheduling is awesome!

Today, I thought about shifting it again. Health and dental appointments are the closest thing I've had to a date in ages, so I should probably be more excited about them and stop shuffling them around on the calendar. But the office is located in a mall in New Hampshire, and it’s the last Saturday before Christmas, so I was dreading a hot mess of difficult parking and too many people. The thing that got me motivated to go was calculating the year’s worth of payroll deductions for the vision plan I wasn't using. It worked, and my wallet shamed me into going. Even with vision coverage, there was a $39 payment due today for digital imaging, which is much better than the old process of dilation. I don't have anyone to drive me after an eye exam (or anything else), so avoiding dilation is ideal.

The payment allowed for an attempt to “enjoy” the remnants of my old Health Savings Account from my job in Tennessee where we had a High Deductible Health Plan. The sales pitch for the HSA included the information that it wasn’t like Flexible Spending Accounts that have to be used by the end of each year, and this type of account could be held until used. The reality is, my account has had a balance since 2013 because every time I've tried to use the frigging account, since moving back home,  the card is declined. Each time I call the bank and receive the explanation that it's because the account has gone into dormancy. The rep removes the status, but by then, the expense has already been paid out of pocket. Once, I was even charged a $5 dormant account fee which I had to include as taxable income on my tax return. Since then, I've been more alert to dormancy, but it doesn't change the fact that I don't have a lot of co-payments and uncovered medical expenses that the account can be used for.

Remembering that the card declined at my last eye exam and most recently a couple months ago at the dentist, I planned ahead to prevent it happening at today's visit. A few weeks ago, I called the bank in Tennessee that holds the account. The person at the call center said she would take the account out of dormancy, and it was with great confidence that I removed the HSA Visa Debit card from my wallet to pay the $39 fee today. It took a few seconds, but just like when the payment attempt at the dentist, the card was declined again. The bank was called while at the eye doctor, but the call center was not open at 11:00 am central time on a Saturday. The recorded message rattled off three different phone numbers for issues that may or may not have applied to me, but it was hard to keep up with the all the info being spewed in the very long message. I also wasn’t equipped with a pen and paper with which to write the phone numbers. A direct connection via “press <insert number> to reach the XYZ department” would be a much better customer experience, but what do I know, I’m just a frustrated banking customer with an immediate issue with specialized account balance being held hostage by dormant account status that activates every six months. Now I can look forward to calling the bank again, and probably in another six to nine months when I need to use the stupid account the same hoops will be jumped through all over again. At this point, closing the stupid account feels like the best option, and I would if I could ever  access it for the allowable expenses it covers.

On the bight side, my eyes are doing great, prescription is unchanged, and, miracle of pre-Christmas miracles, the mall was not crowded. A parking space was found immediately, allowing me twenty minutes to kill before my appointment, so there was a pleasant stroll along the upper level. It’s the most walking I’ve done in months and there was the tiny thrill of feeling like an outlaw being a hair inside the New Hampshire state line. 

Almost deleted an email with important information.

By the time I arrived home, there was already an email survey about today's visit. As I was about to delete the email after completing the survey,  I noticed that an appointment for next year noted is in the message. If that's how the scheduling is done, it's no wonder I didn't know about my appointment earlier this year. I better make a note in the calendar before the next email purge.