Elder Law Answers
How Can We Convince My Father That Moving from the Nursing Home to Our House Is Not an Option?
My disabled father is currently in a nursing home but wants to move in with my husband and me. He needs consta...
Read moreHow Can We Publicly Complain About a Care Manager and Still Get a Refund?
- May 4th, 2015
Q
We hired a geriatric care manager (GCM) to give us recommendations about caring for our mother. We were very unhappy with the product and service and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) asking for a refund of the fee (the GCM is a BBB member). The GCM's response to the BBB included information that we believe violated our privacy. A personal injury lawyer told us that because the GCM was responding to our complaint, what he/she said would likely be “protected” and thus not a violation of privacy law (we are in California). The GCM wants us to sign away our right to say anything to anyone about this before giving the refund, and says that if we don't sign, he/she might consider suing us for defamation.
A
I can see the dilemma. You want to get your money back and protect others from someone you feel did not perform the services he/she promised. The GCM wants to maintain his/her livelihood. The threat of a suit for defamation seems a bit over the top, but I have no expertise in this field. I don’t think you are going to get everything you want – both the ability to speak publicly about your experience and a refund. You should probably make a choice based in large part on how much of a threat to others you feel this person is. If you decide to forego the refund and make your complaints public, it would make sense to get legal advice on the defamation issue. But given the fact that life is short, you might be best off accepting the refund and moving on.
For more about geriatric care managers, click here.
Local Elder Law Attorneys in Ashburn, VA
Meet Mindy Felinton
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Mindy Felinton
Felinton Elder Law & Estate Planning Centers
Mindy Felinton concentrates in the areas of Medicaid planning, Veterans' Benefits, asset protection, nursing home planning, elder law, wills, estate planning, trusts, living wills, powers of attorney, probate administration and trust administration and began her legal career 30 years ago as an Assistant State Attorney...
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Meet Evan Farr
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Evan Farr
The Law Firm of Evan H. Farr, P.C.
In practice since 1987, Fairfax Attorney Evan Farr is widely recognized as one of the leading Elder Law, Estate Planning, and Specials Needs attorneys in Virginia and one of foremost experts in the Country in the field of Medicaid Asset Protection and related Trusts. Evan Farr has been quoted or cited as an expert by n...
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Meet Samantha Fredieu
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Samantha Fredieu
Hale Ball Carlson Baumgartner Murphy PLC
Attorney Samantha Simmons Fredieu is an associate at Hale Ball. Ms. Fredieu graduated magna cum laude from Vermont Law School where she was the symposium editor on the Vermont Law Review, a production editor on the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law, and a member of the Moot Court Advisory Board. She has clerked for...
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