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Msteele
May 3, 2011
Not following contract
In 2007, my mother was declared incompetent by the court due to her having dementia. She was in a nursing home temporarily until I worked to get her into an assisted living home and I decided upon Emeritus at Chestnut Hill(originally it was just Chestnut Hill before Emeritus bought it). I filed for the guardianship but since I could not get bonded, I was named her guardian of person and we got her a separate guardian attorney for her financial matters. The guardian attorney sold her house and took care of her bills for Emeritus at Chestnut Hill and I was never billed for anything and only made sure she was taken care of. In the meantime, Chestnut Hill was bought out by another company(Emeritus) and they asked me to sign a resident agreement because they stated that the attorney had been ignoring it and she needed to have it signed or they would have to evict her. Unfortunately, I signed as her responsible party without knowing what I was doing. When I signed it, the rent was being paid and up to date by the attorney to my knowledge. Well, she had to be moved back to the dementia unit and I was never notified that the rent would be double the original agreed amount and I was under the impression that everything was being paid. The agreement that I signed stated that her rent would be $1752 per month and if there was an increase then I would be notified in writing within 30 days but that never happened. I was never notified and the guardianship attorney continued to pay the original amount that was covered by her social security but the rest went unpaid so it began accumulating without my knowledge or notification as required by the contract from Emeritus at Chestnut Hill. Then in July 2010 they sent me a notice that my mother was being evicted because a balance of $9800 has accumulated on the account. This was the first time I was even aware that there was a balance and the bill was not getting paid. I immediately called the guardianship attorney and he told me not to worry, they probably would not evict her and they were taking the money just to keep the bed filled. Well, they did evict her and she was out of money so I had to find her a nursing home and she had to go on Medicaid. Unfortunately, not long after that, she passed away in September of 2010. So, at the end of September, I get a notice from a collection agency that I owe Emeritus over $11000 for the unpaid bill even though I was never billed or notified of any rate change or of any unpaid balance until it had accumulated to $9800. If I had known the full amount of the bill had not been paid even in the first month, I would have immediately put my mother on medicaid and moved her to a nursing home. Emeritus seems to think it was the guardianship attorney's responsibility even though the attorney was not a party of the contract. I sent them a dispute letter and never heard back from anyone. I just checked my credit report and they have filed an adverse report for over $11000 for this debt. The Emeritus website acts like they care about your loved ones but really they really only care about who pays the bill. As soon as they know your loved one is out of money and the account has an outstanding balance, they will send you immediately to collections. All this for caring about my mothers well-being.
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