HOSPITAL BILLS

That bill doesn't match
what they published.

Hospitals are required by federal law to publish what they charge — every CPT code, every insurance plan, the dollar amount. The bill in your mailbox has to line up with that file. When it doesn't, you can fight it.

How the math breaks.

Three patterns account for almost every disputable charge:

01
Duplicate or phantom charges

A service billed twice. A service you didn't receive. A line item for "supplies" that doesn't match anything that happened in the room.

02
Out-of-network components

A radiologist or anesthesiologist quietly billed at non-contracted rates inside an in-network procedure. Your insurer pays partial; you get the balance.

03
Code upcoding

A more expensive CPT billed for the procedure you actually had. A 99214 billed for a visit that was clinically a 99213. The hospital's own MRF tells you the price difference.

Two ways to fight it.

One you do yourself for free. One a service does for a percentage of what they save you. Pick by how much time you have.

Path 01 · Do it yourself
Free. Takes a few hours.

Pull the hospital's MRF (linked from every hospital row on Itemized). Find your CPT codes. Compare line by line against your itemized bill. Write a dispute letter citing the published rate. Hospitals know they have to honor what they published.

A guide is in the works. For now, the hospital's MRF link on each row is your starting point.
Path 02 · Hand it to a service
No savings, no fee.

Bill negotiation services review your itemized bill, find the disputable charges, and negotiate with the hospital on your behalf. They take a percentage of what they save you. If they don't save anything, you don't pay.

fee: % of savings no upfront cost weeks to resolve
Send your bill to Goodbill → Goodbill is the partner we recommend. Why them: clean consumer brand, transparent pricing, focus on hospital and ER bills specifically.
Honest about the money. We earn a referral fee when you use Goodbill through this page. We picked them because they're the cleanest of the bill-negotiation services we evaluated, and the model (percentage of savings, no fee otherwise) keeps their incentive aligned with yours. We don't take money from hospitals or insurers — that would compromise the data on every other page.