Pretty sure my dentist committed insurance fraud.

My (38f) husband (34m) has genetically really unfortunate teeth. He brushes and flosses more than me (twice a day) and uses two different types of mouth wash and yet he is constantly getting cavities. He has been to a couple of dentists, but we moved and found him a dentist in our new town. This dentist set him up on a 2 year care plan that was going to be $15,000 for everything he needed done. Let me tell you it was a mess from day one. In the first phase, he was to have four cavities filled as his tooth pain was an emergency, and he was to have three teeth pulled and implants placed as well. Once he had had this phase completed, his tooth was still painful. He went back to the dentist, who identified a new tooth which needed to be pulled and replaced with an implant. He did this, and he still had pain. Come to find out, the tooth the dentist last pulled had already had a root canal years prior. A dentist friend of ours told us that it is impossible that the root canal tooth was the one causing pain because there is no nerve. To add insult to injury, one of the crowns they had placed fell off randomly two days after placement. We wrote a letter to the owner stating we wanted a refund for that last implant as well as the crown for poor workmanship and unnecessary procedures. The owner had a meeting with us and said he was so embarrassed and wanted to make this right. He offered to fully refund us for all services to date. We appreciated the offer but felt that it was bad karma since my husband did still get needed work done. We agreed to just the refund for the one implant. The rest we agreed to pay for. Anyway, their professionalism in this matter convinced us to stay with their practice. He had a few more cleanings and fillings over the next couple of years. On his last two visits the doctor changed their policy and said payments needed to be received up front and that they would bill insurance after the fact and send us the reimbursement. So my husband paid $375 out of pocket for two separate appointments. We never received a check from insurance, so we called insurance and they said the checks had gone out to the dentist. We called the dentist and they had kept half of the money and mailed the other half to our old address. We asked them to place send the correct amount to our current address. They mailed us a check for even less than they said over the phone and included a statement showing administration fees of handling the check for $150 as well as a “stop check fee” of $30 placed by their bank since they had to reissue the check. So they not only were paid in full by us, they also kept our insurance money. I spoke to a lawyer who said if we cash the check for smaller amount, it could mean we agree with the amount they owe us. So we haven’t cashed the check. Who should we report them to? It’s such a small case that no attorney is willing to handle it for us. Any advice appreciated.

TLDR: Dentist required payment up front, but they also kept the insurance reimbursement, essentially getting paid twice. Looking for advice on what body to report them to.

submitted by /u/Competitive_End_6599
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