Another Maternity Complaint - Discovery...so disappointing!!

Here we go again with Discovery... Trying to figure out where to even begin!!

I have sent them a claim for Ampath 4 times and I have not had 1 response regarding the claim. Under your "maternity benefit" it mentions that you are fully covered for the blood tests that they do for down syndrome etc after 12 weeks but only half of it was paid - I am still waiting for an explanation. Ampath has now escalated the matter and handed it over to attorneys and I have 20 days to pay it before being put on the credit list - Not sure what more to do in order to escalate the situation.

Then we come to the co-payment at a Netcare hospital and the fact that all the medical costs relating to my unborn baby have to come from my medical aid even though my partner has sufficient medical savings and is on a higher plan than I am (we are on 2 different medical aids with Discovery) - I quite frankly didnt make this baby on my own and once she is born she is going on to her fathers medical aid. We have phoned numerous times to have this escalated to someone that is in a position to authorise us using my partners medical savings in order to cover the costs for the co-payment as well as any shortfalls and every time we are told that we have to use my medical aid because we are on separate medical aids but THIS CHILD IS BOTH OF OURS - could you be anymore ***ist and biased!! If its a paternity test you want - you are more than welcome to do one! Due to Covid we are both financially struggling and if we had the money to pay the co-payment from our pocket we would but things are not normal at the moment and also due to covid - we are being forced to use a netcare hospital because our gynae is there and even though he practices at life hospitals as well because of Covid, he cant guarantee being at the hospital if and when I am going to give birth which means I would have to give birth with gynaecologist I dont know - one of the most important and scariest moments of a womans life... I dont want to have to do this with someone I dont know :(

Last but not least - The antenatal classes - under your maternity benefit - it mentions you are covered for antenatal classes - so you do the antenatal classes - pay for them and then claim. I sent through the invoice for R1800.00 - I got back R117.10 (Shock Face Emoji - pity there are no emoji's on here to really show you how some of us are feeling!!) I then go back and query as to why I only got paid R117.10 - the consultant tells me - that I need to get an invoice with the separate dates of all the antenatal classes with separate amounts because they pay per class (another Shocked face emoji) - have you ever!! The total for the antenatal classes were R1800 - whether you do 4 classes or 20 classes - what difference does it make? - And why dont you communicate this with your client before just processing the claim and paying out what you feel like??? If you do not want to cover these things then tell us so that we can make provision for things and in future look else where for a loyal medical aid.

I love discovery and haven't really had an issue with them in the past but since I became pregnant I've had some extremely unpleasant experiences with them and it makes you think twice if they are really the best medical aid to be on - it might be worthwhile looking into other medical aids and do a comparison rather than believing Discover is the way to go. Pregnancy is a beautiful but also stressful time for a couple, they dont need their medical aid making it even harder for them or making it a horrible experience - very disappointed Discovery!!!