Recently, my dog had an ear infection again. He’s a floppy eared dog and he gets these constantly. We have taken him to the vets time and time again, to discover he only needs the ear infection antibiotic ointment and he’ll be fine.  We happened to be watching TV and saw a commercial for a place to get the basic pet meds online for your pet and they were reasonable at that. So this time knowing all we needed was the meds for his ear infection, we decided to search for pet meds online. Which we did and boy was it ever a lifesaver.

I have found that buying pet meds online really takes the financial burden off my pocket book and lets me help my dog quicker with his ear problems. Of course, if there was more to his condition, I wouldn’t recommend giving up going to the vet completely.

Pet meds online is not only a time saver, but you can find a lot of pet meds that the local pet place may or may not have available yet. The ear infection meds were the exact match to what our vet would prescribe to our dog and the price was only ¼ of the price the vet charges me normally. Couldn’t believe it.

There are a lot of places to buy pet meds online. So I recommend you research the Internet and try to find the right pet med store that meets your needs. I found on some of the sites, you can even send emails requesting information about the pet medicine and they’ll respond back answering any questions you may have.

I graciously took out my wallet to pay for it, even though I know Kaiser’s medical billing process is terrible. They definitely need medical billing training fast.  So remembering all the billing hassles I’ve already faced, I decided to ask what labs were being processed for my son and if I could get a receipt to prove what I’m paying towards. I explained how Kaiser’s medical billing process has double charged us in the past for the same lab work and we would like some kind of receipt and written documentation of what was being done and what we are paying towards.

The lady behind the counter proceeded to tell me that she could not give me that information because my son was between the ages of 12 and 17 years old, due to the children’s medical privacy act that HIPAA has made law. How can that be possible? To be forced to pay for something without having any idea of what I’m paying for. My son even asked to know what he was being tested for and gave permission for the woman to share the information with us, because he wanted our advice about the tests before they were done. She still refused to even give my son the receipt and printout of what lab work was being performed on him. So frustrated and in dismay, I expressed how ridiculous that was and went to wait.

As I went to sit down, I thought to myself this is going to be a medical billing nightmare and I decided to re-approach the medical billing agent.  As I walked up to the counter with my wallet in hand, I slightly tripped and my wallet flew over the counter. She jumped in exaggerated horror and proceeded to call security, as if I deliberately threw my wallet at her to hurt her. This medical billing agent moved back so fast I almost thought she was a fouled NBA star.

The supervising medical billing agent came out and immediately proceeded to help me, by explaining to me their process of billing procedures and the medical privacy act from HIPAA. Realizing that my son gave permission to us, the Parents, to know what tests were taking place and recognizing he was asking for our advice. The supervisor helped us not only to understand the medical billing “bull s**t”, but she got the written documentation I requested and told all of us what the labs were for.

If Kaiser is out there listening, I suggest you get your Medial Billing Training done properly and be sure to clarify to your medical billing agents that the children’s privacy act is basically voided when the child gives permission to the parents to have the information and give the child advise. I would also consider providing documentation of what someone is paying for at the time of service, no matter what. I’m sure you’re breaking some kind of law by blindly billing a client and trying to claim they owe whatever amount you want to claim they owe, hiding behind HIPPA. I’m sick and tired of paying for charges and then months later you being charged again for the same items. Worse yet, Kaiser’s medical billing department isn’t able to provide me receipts for where my payments were applied either. There is definitely something wrong with this system.

Laser hair removal is pretty popular these days. The company was interested in doing some trade out work; I thought to myself should I have laser hair removal done on my face?  I thought about for a moment and decided against it. The laser hair removal process wasn’t my thing.

Laser hair removal seems to be a very interesting process. I searched the Internet to see what kind of information I could find on it. There is a lot of information out there.  If you’re interested in having laser hair removal, I suggest you do your research before selecting a laser hair removal company.

Laser hair removal companies are located all over the country, including Brooklyn, New York and California, just to name a few. Something to consider if you really want unsightly hairs removed through the laser hair removal process.

Well, I have learned my fair share about student loans recently. I have a son that I sent to college in Phoenix around September of 2007. It wasn’t until then that I figured out how the whole student loan process worked. Believe me– it was a nightmare process sending him to college compared to when I attended college. I didn’t need my parents to help me go to college.  Now-a-days kids aren’t treated like adults even at 18 years old when applying for college. The government makes parents hold their hands financially through the whole process. What’s that all about?

Now that my son has dropped out of college, we will be looking for a student loan consolidation. You might ask what is student loan consolidation?  It’s the process of combining all the loans received into one big consolidated loan.

I’m also looking for some sites that might have some student loan consolidation comparisons on them, since it is getting close to payback time. Especially with all the eye-catching offers coming in the mail lately that seem to be offering great rates. I’m starting to wonder if consolidating is my best option? What would you consider the best route possible for student loan consolidation?

Are there any student loan consolidation rules I should be aware of? How about any student loan consolidation loans at great interest rates? I hear there are even student loan consolidation rebates.

If anyone has any ideas on any of this, I would appreciate hearing your insight on the issue.

Car donations are definitely a good thing.  Car donations to the Veterans is even better, not only because they are a great organization to donate to, but they help support our true hero’s of this great nation of ours.

I have seen people give a lot of car donations to the Brooklyn area in New York, Chicago, and Texas as well.  The Chicago car donation program is pretty impressive. Seems like there is always someone wanting a donated car here in California too.

Many people are not willing to donate their cars to charity or other places because they want to maximize their trade-in value at a dealership.  I say… leave the dealer out of it and try to donate your car. It sure could work out better in the long run to donate a car to the needy.

After verifying it was a true red ring of death and taking a picture, I immediately called Microsoft and was routed to an outsourced call center.  During this conversation, I started to talk with the outsourced support agent.  The agent kept telling me “Thank you for your problem” and then couldn’t stop telling me “thank you,” “Please be patient,” and “We will solve you”. Seemed really odd, but hilarious.

After 45 minutes of waiting on hold for the outsourced call center agent to find a solution, he finally came back on the line with an answer of “Thank you for your problem and I am glad to solve you.” Trying to hold back my laughter, I said, “How did you solve me?”

The outsourced call center agent said, “Your device is out of warranty, but we have extended it to solve your problem and will fix it.”  The only thing I would have to do is get my own box for shipping the system back to them.

I found myself relating this whole experience to a movie I recently watched called “Outsourced.” In the movie, a company outsourced their call center to India. Which seems to be exactly what Microsoft has done with their support.  One part of the call was extremely familiar, because I asked the support rep where he was located and he told me Chi…caaaaa..go. That was one of the classic scenes in the “Outsourced” movie itself.

Outsourcing is Bad for American business. Outsourced call centers are even worse for a hard American worker like myself to deal with. Just dealing with a rep about a broken product is difficult enough in itself, but add an extreme language barrier of an outsourced call center agent and you’ve created and instantly unbearable situation.

One company that I highly respect, Apple, hasn’t resorted to outsourcing their call centers to a foreign county. Apple seems to know that customer service and the ability to understand the representative your talking to is vitally important to keeping customers.

While working on a client site, I had the rare opportunity to familiarize myself with the use of VoIP phones; what they are and how they work. Much to my amazement, they are pretty simple devices that require some knowledge of the Internet in general to get them working. These devices are not for the faint of heart.

I started out trying Vonage. Vonage was a decent system, but at $24.99 a month they have almost priced themselves out of the phone market.  The Vonage service was easy to use, simple voicemail, and the ability to email .wav files of your voice mails to you, but it has no teleconferencing ability.

Then I decided to try Skype. It costs about $30.00 a year, which is very affordable. At first it seemed to work well using it on the computer. After buying Skype’s hardware device, it seemed to really throw off the system and all of a sudden I was dropping calls, echo sounding, and clients complained that it sounded like I was talking in an aquarium. Skype’s ability to teleconference was pretty seamless and easy to use through the computer, but through the hardware device the handset never could recognize the key commands or work efficiently. This was a major downside to the product and service.

Vocalocity costs about $39.99 a month, plus buying their phone that costs around $199.00.  Well all I can say is “if you have the money to throw away, then this is the system you want”. The system is really efficient, easy to use, with 24×7 support and great teleconferencing abilities built in. To me, it’s a bit pricier than I wanted to pay.

Finally there is Ooma, Ooma is a device that you plug-in to your current high speed Internet connection and instantly get phone service for free. The device at the time I purchased it was a $399.00 one-time fee, which covered the device and unlimited calling in the United States. The major plus side of this device was that Ooma’s system controlled the throttling of bandwidth allocated to the unit. For example, if you’re on the phone and everyone in your office or family is downloading YouTube videos, Ooma automatically recognizes the telephone is priority over other Internet usages. Another feature that Ooma offers is the ability to be notified via SMS or email sent to you directly when a new voicemail arrives. I really love this feature because I’m always on the move or out and about and I never miss a call. There is only one down side to Ooma, there are no real teleconferencing abilities.

After comparing all the devices for quality, ease of use, and reasonable expense, Ooma wins hands down. Especially with no monthly service fee required to make phone calls. 

When it comes to teleconferencing, there are always great services to use such as freeconference.com that really take the work out of needing a device that does teleconferencing at all.

Every Tuesday, they write a Risk Management Watch article that is very informative. When A.E. Feldman blogs, it’s worth reading because they sure do know what they’re talking about.  If you get a chance, head over to their blog and see for yourself.

A lot of executive recruiting firms like to call themselves “headhunters“, which is the term used for recruiters.  It seems as if a lot of executive recruiters are placing more of their efforts in to Search Engine Marketing space.  A.E. Feldman has the most knowledgeable staff I have ever seen when it comes to marketing, social media, and executive placement. They know what they are doing.

If you are an executive professional looking for a job or a company looking for a recruiting firm, I suggest you give A.E. Feldman a look. You won’t be disappointed.  Be sure to check out their Executive Recruiting Firm Blog as well. They provide a lot of great tips.