A Dog-Eat-Dog Business, Part 11

 “This is Doctor Oppenheim,” I repeated several times before hanging up. Caller ID identified the Doubletree in Santa Monica, so I phoned to ask if someone had requested a doctor. Someone had.

“You answered, but you couldn’t hear me,” said the guest. “So I called the front desk again, and they gave me a different number. Another doctor is coming.”

That was upsetting because the Doubletree is a regular. When asked, the guest gave me the 800 number of Hotel Doctors International, a service based in Miami.

“How much are they charging?” I asked.

“I don’t know. They just asked if I had insurance.”

That was a red flag. Many hotel doctor agencies charge spectacular fees and then assure guests that travel insurance will reimburse them. Forewarned of our rapacious medical system, foreign travelers rarely make a fuss – and foreign travel insurance generally pays outrageous fees. But American insurance doesn’t.

I told the guest, an American, that my fee was $300 and that he should call the agency and ask what it charged. It turned out to be $650 (far from the largest I’ve heard), so I made the housecall.

Afterward, standing on tiptoes to peer over the front desk, I saw the colorful business card of Hotel Doctors International stuck on the counter. The clerk, who had insisted that mine was the only number she knew, expressed surprise when I pointed it out.