40: The Battle to Make the Health Insurers Obey the Law - Part 3: 7 October 2024

To recap, Margaret had a surgical procedure on Wednesday 1 December 2021 which revealed that her death was close. 

The surgeon did a second operation in the evening of Friday 3 December.

Just before the surgeon did his operation on 3 December, I emailed my very first letters of complaint about our health insurer ignoring the law.  I sent written official complaints to HCF and the Commonwealth Ombudsman.

As soon as she could after the 3 December operation, Margaret phoned me to say I could bring her home.  With no intervening treatment between the operations on 1 and 3 December, the cancer had shrunk so dramatically that the surgeon told Margaret she could go home.

I know with certainty that Margaret’s life was extended because I had decided to force the health insurers to obey the law.  I knew I would never permit the health insurers to continue scamming cancer patients who used the services offered by Lift Cancer Care Services.

At that point, I did not know that the then Australian Health Minister Mr Greg Hunt, senior officers in the Australian Health Department who reported to Greg Hunt, the Commonwealth Ombudsman and a wide range of other government agencies had zero interest in stopping the health insurance scams.

An objective, outside observer might well form the view - yes this is indeed legal jargon, but there are good reasons for the jargon - that the Minister, the Health Department and the Ombudsman had secret reasons for wanting to allow the health insurance scams to continue.

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These are the responses I received from the Ombudsman to my letter of complaint sent on 3 December 2021.

Email received on 14 December 2021

Our Ref: PHI-2021-101690  Dear Thomas Thank you for contacting the Office of the Commonwealth Ombudsman about the issues you have experienced with HCF. Your complaint reference number is PHI-2021-101690. I have considered the information you have provided. In this case, I am giving HCF a final opportunity to resolve the matter with you directly. I have escalated your complaint to a senior staff member of HCF for further review and response. The insurer has been asked to contact you within 3 business days to discuss the issues you have raised. Once the insurer has reached an outcome with you, they will provide our Office with a copy of the response. If HCF does not contact you by close of business on Monday, 20 December 2021, or you are dissatisfied with the response and want to pursue the matter further, please contact me by email at ombudsman@ombudsman.gov.au or on 1300 362 072.  Thank you for raising your concerns with this Office. Kind regards, Sarah De Sade Complaints Officer Private Health Insurance Commonwealth Ombudsman Phone:   1300 362 072 Email:     ombudsman@ombudsman.gov.au Website: ombudsman.gov.au

 

I sent this reply to the Ombudsman on 20 December 2020

Attention: Sarah De Sade   Dear Sarah, Thank you for your email dated 15 December concerning my complaint regarding HCF. In your email, you advised that you had given HCF a “final opportunity to resolve the matter” with me directly, that you had “escalated” my complaint to “a senior member of HCF for further review and response” and that I should contact you again if I do not receive a satisfactory response from HCF by close of business on Monday 20 December 2021. I have received no substantive response to my complaint from HCF and I therefore request that the Ombudsman intervene to resolve this complaint as soon as possible. This is the response that I received from HCF by email at 4.10 pm today Monday 20 December 2021. “Dear Mr Hankin, HCF have recently been approached by the Office of the Private health Insurance ombudsman (PHIO), querying your HCF policy, specifically services received by Lift Cancer Care. Firstly, we wish to acknowledge the concerns raised. We are actively investigating this matter and continue to do so, during this time we will be in contact with updates and to provide our response once we have finalised our review. If you do have any questions, we can be reached on 02 9290 8872 between 9am – 5pm, Monday – Friday, AEDT or by email on jlindsay@hcf.com.au Please let us know if you have any questions.   Kind regards,  Junita “

 You may have already guessed it, but these emails were the most informative emails I got from either HCF or the Ombudsman - ever.

The Ombudsman and HCF simply ignored my complaints.

From: Sarah De Sade <Sarah.DeSade@ombudsman.gov.au> Sent: Tuesday, 21 December 2021 1:05 PM To: johnhankin@internode.on.net Subject: Commonwealth Ombudsman complaint - Ref PHI-2021-101690 [SEC=OFFICIAL]   OFFICIAL  Dear John  Thank you for your recent email.  HCF appear to have responded within the three day timeframe requested by the Office to advise “we are actively investigating this matter and continue to do so, during this time we will be in contact with updates and to provide our response once we have finalised our review”  In my experience internal fund investigations such as this can take anywhere upwards of 10 days to complete depending on the complexity of the issues.   Our Office will need to wait until there is an outcome from HCFs review in order to decide if there is anything further to pursue in this case.  Please note that our Office closes for Xmas shutdown from 24 Dec – 4th Jan.   Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions.  Kind regards  Sarah de Sade   Senior Complaints Officer  Private Health Insurance COMMONWEALTH OMBUDSMAN phone 1300 362 072 email phi@ombudsman.gov.au website www.ombudsman.gov.au  The Office of the Commonwealth Ombudsman acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia and their continuing connection to land, culture and community. We pay our respects to elders past and present.

 My wife and other patients of Lift were deadly ill because of cancer but the Ombudsman did not give a rat’s arse.  It was irrelevant that Margaret and the others might die if they did not get the treatments their health insurance was supposed to guarantee them – but it was vitally important for the Ombudsman to tell me how much it respected Australia’s unnamed Aboriginal elders past and present.

There was no further correspondence from either the Ombudsman or HCF in 2021. 

 

 

 

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 This was Margaret with her “wonderful” friend Anne Ryan on 18 April 2018, 2 years before her cancer diagnosis.  This is the same Anne Ryan whose cancelled Margaret and refused to come to her funeral on 31 August 2023.  Anne told me that her retirement pension from Maynooth University was €63,000 per year.  She is prosperous and definitely had the money for the air fare to Adelaide for the funeral.  I ensured the gap between Margaret’s death and the funeral was sufficient to permit her to come to the funeral.  

I took the photo of Margaret and Anne Ryan during a visit to the Buddhist Temple at Sellick’s Hill, south of Adelaide.  The temple is beautiful.

The photo above is of the statue of the Boddhisatva Kwan Yin, located at the temple.  Kwan Yin is the embodiment of compassion and Anne expressed great admiration for the qualities of compassion represented by Kwan Yin

 

This is Margaret in Ireland with Aine Ryan, wife of Paul Ryan on 1 September 2017.  Paul is brother of Anne Ryan.  Neither Paul, Aine nor their daughter Paula had the decency to send any messages of condolence to me when Margaret died.  I have no idea what they were told by Anne Ryan to make them act in such a despicable fashion, but the lies told them must have been great whopping lies.