ANP/Phil NijhuisMaternity help at work
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 05:08
Expectant parents receive a hefty bill if they cancel maternity care before giving birth, according to a tour by the NOS. These ‘fines’ can amount to 275 euros, even if you cancel early in the pregnancy.
Due to the shortage of maternity assistants, many parents register with multiple organizations in the hope of receiving maximum care. It is not always clear that the online registration is immediately a registration. After two weeks, expectant parents are automatically bound to a contract, which means they pay a fine if they want to cancel maternity care.
150 euros is a lot of money for maternity care that you did not purchase.
Mother of a newborn child
Lieke* was still studying when she turned out to be pregnant. “Midwives and those around me insisted that I had to quickly register for maternity care because of the crowds. So I registered with four different organizations after 13 weeks of pregnancy, hoping that there was still room somewhere.”
To her surprise, after two weeks she received an email informing her that her registration with maternity care organization Naviva was final. “It turned out that I had concluded a contract, it was not an online registration without obligation. That meant that I had to pay 150 euros in cancellation costs, even though there had not even been an introduction.”
In the meantime, Lieke had already found maternity care elsewhere. She quickly decided to call the other maternity care organizations where she had registered. “Fortunately, after much pleading, they turned out to have more sympathy than Naviva. They reduced the amount to 15 euros and 37 euros. So it is apparently not the norm to charge that much money.”
There are more than 200 maternity care organizations in the Netherlands. The NOS looked at the conditions of more than 50 organizations. The vast majority charge cancellation fees in one way or another.
Naviva, a national organization that helps about 22,000 families every year, has been charging 150 euros since last year. For comparison: a maternity care organization receives that amount for more than two hours of maternity care. They are not allowed to declare 20 euros for just a registration.
At some agencies, the amount depends on how far the pregnancy has progressed. For example, Kraamvogel, another large national organization, charges 75 euros up to two months before the birth. Then that amount is doubled.
No maternity care agency charges costs if there is a miscarriage.
Naviva said in a response that they charge the costs “to discourage double registrations with us and other maternity care organizations”. The company says it will reserve capacity for those dually enrolled families, directing others to a waiting list.
“This cannot be the intention for this to happen, because others have registered in multiple places,” says a spokesperson. Naviva also says it has an “extensive leniency arrangement”. The full response from the maternity care organization can be read here.
English-language maternity care
Adrienne Salcau found this leniency arrangement disappointing. She registered with all kinds of maternity care organizations, with the specific request for an English-speaking maternity caregiver. “Some called me saying they didn’t have a place,” says Salcau. “Other agencies, such as Naviva, did not make any noise at all.”
She eventually registered with a maternity care organization that said it had an English-speaking person. When she subsequently wanted to cancel Naviva at 16 weeks of pregnancy, she also had to pay 150 euros in cancellation costs.
“Somewhere at the bottom of a Dutch email, which I could not read, it said that cancellation costs were involved. While I had written when I registered that I only spoke English. They did nothing for me after my registration, but they will charge the costs. I cried about it.”
Something similar happened to Arjan Groen and his wife at De Kraamvogel. They overlooked the email after registering. “Awkward,” says Groen. “But also quite strange that an agreement takes effect automatically, without our explicit consent.”
They also had to pay 75 euros. “When we refused, they said they would call in a collection agency. We thought that was harsh.” Green eventually offered to pay half and De Kraamvogel agreed.
But the aftertaste is bitter. “It is clear that they are taking advantage of the situation and want to cash in on people who are not paying attention to the small print,” says Groen. De Kraamvogel was asked for a response, but the company did not respond to questions from NOS.
“Parents go astray”
Trade organization Bo Geboortezorg also attributes the cancellation costs to the major shortage in maternity care. “More and more parents are wandering and registering with multiple agencies,” says director Peter Boudewijn. “If they then cancel maternity care, the organization can no longer declare the costs incurred to the insurance.”
Yet he calls the requested amounts “significant”, also in relation to the work that has been done so far. “They are intended to deter parents,” says Boudewijn. “But we absolutely don’t like it if it comes as a surprise. That must be clearly communicated.”
The trade organization is working on a solution. “We are looking at whether health insurers can notify in advance if someone has already registered somewhere, instead of afterwards,” says Boudewijn. “Because in the end no one benefits from all those cancellations.”
*Lieke is not the real name of the interviewee. Her full name and contact details are known to the editors.
2024-04-08 03:08:49
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