[thankful69]

I'm curious, lets say person A needs a complex surgery, gets a bill for 200k usd, because A uses Pocketero, A only pays 100k, do people actually pay that sum at once, or they just try to get a payment plan, etc...? Because for a low income family(the ones that can't afford insurance) a payment plan for 100k or 200k doesn't really make a difference (is a lot), and most low income family would just declare bankruptcy (they usually have low credit score anyway and are not in the housing market, or anything like that). What's is the point of paying for a service that would only get me a discount of a huge expense, instead of "guaranteeing" that I won't owe hundreds of thousands to a hospital(with an insurance)?

[pocketero-dan]

You're right, there are medical expenses so huge that even big discounts won't meaningfully help avoid bankruptcy. But let's not only consider worst case scenarios, let's also consider more common scenarios:

- A non-complex surgery that retails for $20k and is discounted to $5k (hopefully on a payment plan). - A specialist consultation that retails for $1000 and is discounted to $250. - An urgent care visit that retails for $400 and is discounted to $100.

There are 30 million Americans who don't have health insurance [1] largely because it costs $541/mo on average [2]. Aren't these people well served by a "best price" network at $10/mo?

[1] https://www.simplyinsurance.com/how-many-americans-dont-have... [2] https://www.valuepenguin.com/average-cost-of-health-insuranc...