I received 2 calls on my home phone and 3 on my cell. The caller ID read "Patient Accounts" and a woman left a "Reminder of appointment tomorrow" message on my home machine. Then a woman made 3 calls to my cell and in a demanding voice, asked if I was "Jone Doe". The appoinment for an early Outpatient Surgery was made less than an hour before the calls and my chart reflected that I was staying in a motel next to the hospital ( rather than drive 300 miles home and back). The calls MUST have been made by a third party agency, a very poor, yet more and more common business practice. These "agencies", are contracted to make most ANY kind of call, giving NO THOUGHT to whom is being called, or why. Most of the time, these people are underpaid and overworked and in a BAD mood when they call. Not long ago, a medical clinic I delt with, lost over $5000 in reimbursements, directly because they used a third party billing agency, a tough lesson learned as not long after, they went broke.