Mine has his patients take a battery of tests which ran something like $700 before offering the letter. His normal hourly fee runs about that, so it's not out of line using my doc's prices as a guide. That said, mine does charge a higher than what I believe to be average price because it's exclusively a gender clinic which does not take insurance.
Not being told upfront about the cost is unfair though. If nothing else, I would be upset with that.
I should say that fee is for surgeries. I don't recall the clinic charging me anything extra to get a script for hormones, though maybe that is covered by their overall higher rates and doing it in-house.
I didn't have to pay anything extra. The only thing I had to pay was my co-pay (back when I was insured) and she wrote the letter (after she felt I was ready and we were in agreeance on this) when I found a doctor and contacted him.
I think it's awful to make a patient pay extra for something like this. It's a referral letter; your primary care physician doesn't charge you extra if you need a referral to someone else. Neither should therapists. You should have to pay for the services rendered, up to and including any referrals.
I had to pay $40 which was the hourly rate for the half hour it (supposedly) took her to write the letter. I thought even that was too much as it was obvious the letter was written by adding in my name to a template and pressing print. $125 sounds awfully steep to me, but probably cheaper than starting over with a new therapist.
I can't recall if I was charged by either therapist when I got my letters. However, from a business stand point, it is sort of legitimate. You are requesting the doctor perform a service of typing up a letter, etc. If it was performed by an office assistant, I would be annoyed to be paying full fees for the job. But if the therapist typed it up themselves, you did consume a period of their time and as professionals, they are elegible to be paid for the time spent typing your letter.
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Not being told upfront about the cost is unfair though. If nothing else, I would be upset with that.
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I think it's awful to make a patient pay extra for something like this. It's a referral letter; your primary care physician doesn't charge you extra if you need a referral to someone else. Neither should therapists. You should have to pay for the services rendered, up to and including any referrals.
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