Zocdoc

So far I've been very pleased with ZD; your listings for doctors and dentists that are eligible for my insurance are more comprehensive than my actual insurance plan's website, which is really really sad. Not only do you list more available doctors, but your contact information for them is more current, and I like how every doctor profile includes ratings and reviews, so I don't have to travel over to Yelp.

One thing that disappoints me is the limitations on saving doctor profiles. ZD will store the information of doctors and dentists that I've visited, but now I'm looking for an eye doctor and I'd like to be able to save the potentials to my profile for further research, but I don't see an option to do that. ZD will only save doctors to my profile that I've already been to see. This frustrates me, because this is the sort of shopping around that takes weeks, and I can't remember names very well. Let's have a 'Future' subsection in the profile along with 'Current' providers, shall we?

Zocdoc seems to take perverse pleasure in sowing confusion and bombarding potential clients with excessive registration hoops. This includes Happier Living, a snarky and ineffective portal that you're unfortunately forced to engage with.

After completing the Zocdoc registration, I was compelled to do the same with Happier Living. I was then directed to select from another list of medical professionals and set up another appointment - even though I'd already scheduled one on Zocdoc!

I made five appointments with a healthcare provider, only for each to be cancelled mere hours before the scheduled time. Bear in mind, I'd arranged my schedule to accommodate these appointments, and lo and behold, I was dismissed without explanation!

At this point, I called Happier Living, and found myself on hold for just shy of an hour, at which point I finally hung up! Over the past week, I have hopped from one task to another, refilled out forms, endured email barrages that would make any spam marketer proud, and achieved absolutely nothing - except for emptying a bottle of Excedrin!

Would I recommend them? Not on your life, seriously!

So far, I have really loved using ZocDoc. I shop for doctors based off of reviews more than anything else, so it's a great resource from that regard. I have only had one instance, too, where I wasn't able to schedule an appointment online because the wrong availability was shown, but ZocDoc's wonderful customer service immediately worked to resolve the problem.

Overall, my experience with using ZocDoc has been stellar. I look forward to future improvements to the site, but generally find it a great resource for finding great quality providers. So far I have a found an amazing Primary Care physician, dentist, gynecologist, and dermatologist using it's resources. I love that it helps me find doctors who accept my specific insurance and also gives more information about specialties so that I can be sure I'm finding the best possible doctor for my conditions. In addition, it is SO convenient being able to fill out my medical information only once and have it pre-fill registration forms when I schedule an appointment with a new physician.

I would totally recommend ZocDoc to others.

Got a call from ZocDoc from a rep explaining the "new billing model" beginning October 1,2018. They will be charging $35 for each new patient. How can doctors afford this? A standard new patient office visit reimburses and average of $58! They don't even take into account patients that are already coming to the office who will book for the 1st time on ZocDoc. They'll charge $35 for those patients, too. A returning patient visit reimburses even LESS. $5 is one thing $35 is extortion.

For the number of mistakes they make every day in tracking patient visits, this will present not only a financial hardship for doctors but put a strain of administrators trying to review the account for billing errors.

This is an unreasonable, preclusive fee. If a patient has a problem and the doctor takes care of it, the patient won't need to come back unless they have a new problem. It will take 3-5 visits to recoup that $35 fee! Since they're the most popular booking program they have their doctors between a rock and a hard place. Either use them or remove yourself from the market.

When I tried to communicate my concerns to the rep, his attitude was "like it or lump it." His actual words were, "This model will take effect October 1st whether you agree or not." Thank goodness I recorded the conversation because it's quite an earfull.