Yawning emptiness

Not much going on in my letterbox these days. Before twothree weeks ago, I thought the next rejection would be a long time coming. In the meantime, I'm wondering whether I've been forgotten. Or whether I have forgotten something. I've met all the deadlines and answered all the letters, haven't I?

Okay, let's recap what's been going on between my dear health insurance company and me over the last few months. I've already told you that I have take the piss leave.

27.11.2023 Application for assumption of costs if you bring your own nursing service for your first hospitalisation
18.12.2023 Application for assumption of costs if you bring your own nursing service for a second hospitalisation
16.1.2023 Rejection of my proposals one and two
15.2.2024 Sent off my objection to the rejection of my applications one and two
15.2.2024 Confirmation of receipt of my objection to the refusal of out-of-hospital intensive care during the first and second inpatient treatments
15.2.2024 Third application sent
15.2.2024 Confirmation of receipt for my third application
22.2.2024 Rejection of my application for a third hospitalisation
26.2.2024 Appeal procedure sent off 22/02/2024 (third hospitalisation)
27.2.2024 Confirmation of receipt of my objection to the refusal of out-of-hospital intensive care during the third inpatient treatment from 22 February 2024

Then I went through the mail again. Not that I'd missed anything. Anyone who knows me knows how I feel about business paper mail in 2024. Waste of paper, useless, superfluous, unreliable and insecure. Ecologically and economically nonsensical. But for some reason, the AOK believes that letters are more secure than the "secure electronic mailbox of the AOK". Er, yeah, right. I honestly don't know how to react to this. The TÜV-Süd-certified data protection officer (DPO) in me feels like bile. That's great. Now I have to think about all the bears that weren't rescued. If you've lost the thread, take a look here.

Safety is one of those things. If I didn't have it in writing from the AOK, I wouldn't believe it. I once asked, more out of interest, why I only receive authorisations for previously approved applications, requests to send in proof of salary, advertising and reminders via the electronic mailbox. In other words, only spam. Official statement: For security reasons, "important" correspondence should only be sent by post. I'm not joking, that really was the reply I received.

Regarding the inbox of my electronic mailbox, I would like to point out that my income has been well above the contribution assessment ceiling for years, and yet I am repeatedly asked to submit proof of salary. Which I don't do. I could earn half as much and still pay the same health insurance contribution and long-term care insurance contribution. Why bother?

Regarding the inbox of my electronic mailbox, it should be noted that the AOK naturally has several SEPA mandates for all kinds of due dates. Nevertheless, I receive payment reminders every few months, which escalate into threats of debt collection proceedings if I don't respond. I then always send the one-liner "Have fun with the legal proceedings." And after that, I never hear another word. An indictment.

As far as the inbox of my electronic mailbox is concerned, it seems almost disgusting when important messages are not answered in a reasonable amount of time, but ten bottles of water for the humidifier are reliably authorised every few weeks. When I also see how the AOK stuffs the money up my provider's arse with a plunger, that's what the money is for. I should probably be grateful for it too. In the days of the NIV mask, I had to pay for the water for the humidifier myself. The legislator was not familiar with mask ventilation and mistakenly assumed that humidification was not necessary for mask ventilation. And so they decided that humidifying water would only be covered for tracheotomised patients, but not for mask ventilation. Totally barmy. Has anyone ever considered taking legal action against this? Medically vital, here are ten expert opinions and the official guidelines for intensive care, section Ventilation, subsection NIV Ventilation, here: passive humidification, case closed. Thank you and goodbye.

Regarding the inbox of my electronic mailbox, it should be noted that advertising really has no place in it.

My application to use the AOK's electronic mailbox and to do without letter post was therefore rejected.

So I requested that my mailbox be closed and deleted with immediate effect. What do I want with another rubbish P.O. box that not even the provider itself uses? At least that was possible and since then I have received all mail from my health insurance company by letter. Well, I have now looked through this mail again. I virtually retrieved every letter from the AOK from the file, so to speak. Nothing.

No rejection of my first objection for rejection one and two. No rejection of my second objection for rejection three. I wonder if the letters got lost at the oh-so-reliable post office. At least it's sleeting and snowing again.

Do I really have to read the SGB to find out how long the health insurance fund has to respond to my objection? And when does the deadline start for me to take legal action? Where does it even say that? SGB IV? That bored me during my studies. We have a lot of laws that are bad. But the Social Code is bad, anti-social and boring to boot.

But what can you do? There are already big mountains in your way. But everything could be so easy. Let's see. It's best to write the two articles for Thursday and Friday, then submit the tax returns for 2022 by the end of the month (and prepare them before then...), a little report for Wednesday wouldn't go amiss either. I'm already done for tomorrow, so there's a lot to get through. Wink smiley. And after all that, I'll take care of my health insurance. Maybe.

With this in mind, I hope you had a pleasant Sunday evening.