Hi, my name is Fred and I have had a bad time with ADP and their handling of my Cobra account. Every time I pay my bill to ADP, I have to call ADP directly to expedite my updates. I will start from the beginning- I lose job. Job sends Cobra health plan continuation forms which I fill out, along with a yellow cobra subsidy form. I fill these two forms out by making election to continue health coverage under my original plan’s group rate (you also have to setup an online account with ADP). Thanks to the Obama administration and I mean this sincerely, I have had an opportunity to enjoy a reduce rate on premium cost (65% reduction) a benefit from the stimulus bill (24 months total cobra, 15 months of the 24 government subsidized stimulus money).
ADP is the middle man who coordinates all the updates every time I make an online payment to their company. The problem I have with ADP is in the updates they are required to do every time I make a payment: one update to my health insurance provider and one to my prescription drug plan. I feel like I am doing all the footwork since every single month I pay my bill, I have to call an ADP supervisor to have him/her send out the authorization to my insurance company. There is an inherent delay with their system, a system that in the 21st century should be fully automated. I pay 102% which is my 100% obligation plus a 2% administrative cost. If I'm always calling ADP’s people, waiting on phone, dealing with the run around and total pre-packaged responses from ADP’s unintelligible staff of holes, then shouldn't I get my 2% back for having to do all the administrative duties myself. Their delayed reaction to my updates has triggered a chain of events that has snowballed into one misfortune after another while always finding new ways of inconveniencing me more and more.
For example, around Christmas time and a week before the New Year, I discovered that I was uninsured for a period of 3 month. I had already made three months of payments to ADP, all on time, but all this time I thought I was insured, ADP never sent the updates to my insurance companies. Three months is the length of time between doctor visits with my specialist. My account was inactive during that entire period and goes inactive every month on the month regardless of my payment (which is always on time). So during the period of time I thought I was insured, I went to my specialist, payed my co-pay and then from there to my local pharmacy to refill a prescription. My local pharmacy told me that my account was inactive and had been for months- now I’m thru the roof. ADP is clearly stealing my money no doubt about it. Now I have a bill that I can’t resubmit and a headache that reactivates every 1st of the month. I loathe ADP to the very core and have nothing nice to say about them or their shady business practices.
I do have some advice though in regard to expediting the update process. If you make a payment on- line then do the following:
1. After you make payment, wait until payment confirmation is sent via email before calling (you have to call ADP every single month you make a payment).
2. Call and ask to speak with a supervisor instantly- this will be difficult to do so be stern and stick to your guns. Your ADP customer service person will try to persuade you to handle the problem with them. Just give them all pertinent information such as name and account information and remind them that you want to speak with an ADP supervisor. They may proceed to tell you that “a request for an update has been made” or that they have “sent claim to the research department”. This is ridiculous! so at that point you must absolutely demand to speak with an ADP supervisor. Once obliged, you will have to wait a long time.
3. Once an ADP supervisor is on the line, tell him/her you need an “update immediately”. For some reason when you use the word “update” they know exactly what to do at that point(push button on keyboard) . Your complaint is already on file(I must have like 4 dozen complaints) on their computer in front of them . At this point you will have to wait for a long time before you get the “ok”, so put phone on speaker and make a tuna fish sandwich-toasted.
