hello, i'm gerri willis and this is "your bottom line." the show that saves you money. we'll tell you what your providers doesn't want you to know and how it's costing you. do your kids know how to manage money when you're not around? and a special guesting with elmo is here to talk about helping your children understand these tough economic times. elmo, take it away. >> all right. "your bottom line" starts right now. while the health care reform debate goes on and on in washington, we want to tell you

what you can do right now to get the best care possible. our next guest is here to tell you secrets your insurance company doesn't want you to know. francis roth is a senior editor with "health" magazine. great to see you. >> great to see you. >> the first thing you say is don't pay if you don't have a say. what does that mean? >> you know that if you choose to go to see a doctor whose out of network you'll pay more. sometimes you don't have the choice. if you are in an emergency room situation or if you're at the hospital and them use an anesthesiologist out of network you didn't get to pick the doctor so you shouldn't have to pay. >> can you say? >> you can. you send a letter to the insurance company and it's one of the weighing you can get really good results. >> and you say use a letter. that's the best way to make your point and make your case? >> absolutely. >> tell me about the kinds of things that state law might require that you be covered for that you may not know about?

>> in vitvitro fertilization treatments. who would know that you get that coverage mandated by your state? >> there's a great website called families usa.org and you can find out what is covered by your state. your insurance company won't advertise the fact you get that coverage. >> bottom line, you may not know what you're covered for? >> that's right. >> it pays to look around and make sure you know everything. let's talk about the test that i want that i can't get but my insurer doesn't want to pay for. you say to put the screws to them. how do you do that? >> that's something that you really do want to discuss with your doctor. certain people have a health background or family history of a disease and so, maybe you are not 50 yet, but you feel like you have symptoms -- like an example, colon cancer, you think you want to get checked. you want a colonoscopy and you have to talk 'your complaints

and symptoms. >> maybe a little white lie about how bad it is? >> i'm not saying white lie. you should know exactly what kinds of things they are looking for to get that test. so you can go online and get a lot of information. >> a lot of people get turned down willie nilly because the tests are expensive so that's a good way to think about getting help. you're saying that it pays to write letters instead of sending e-mails or making phone calls. that's the way to get action? >> if you have ever called your insurance company before you know you can waste hours being passed around from person-to-person and with e-mails, sometimes they don't get back to you so the best thing to do is to write a letter because then you can hang on to that letter and you can also send it, a copy of it, to your state health insurance commissioner. >> i don't always think of my doctor at my ally but you should. >> your doctor can be a great weapon for you in trying to get coverage. for example, if your doctor prescribes physical therapy for you and the health insurance company says, we're not covering

that, your doctor can call the health insurance company and say that they are going to lodge a complaint with the state commission. >> that's a great idea and it's simple. that's not hard to do to ask your doctor to write a letter. let's talk about advocates. i know more and more people are hiring advocates to help them out. this system is really, really complicated. >> it is very complicated. a lot of us are working with our elderly aging parents who have complicated medical issues. i know my mom certainly does. i do not have the time to spend to call all these places and write the letters so you can hire a health care advocate and they'll write the letters for you and they know the in's and out's of the system and know the changing laws. >> how much do they cost? >> $300 to $400 a year. >> may be worth it if you have a complicated situation. thank you so much, francis. getting you the information you need on health care doesn't end when the show is over. head to cnn.com/health care to

answer questions and fact checks and how health care reform could impact you, your health and your bottom line. we talked a lot about the proposals, politics and policies of health care reform. what really matters are the people who need it most. catherine howard was 29, self-employed and living in san francisco. she bought a health insurance policy she thought was perfect for her, a healthy young person. but then cancer struck and she found she was other hook for thousands of dollars in uncovered expenses. our photo journalist, jeff king, has her tell the story in today's "health care and focus" piece. i have a great job. but i live like a pauper because i basically spend all of my money servicing the debt that i accrued while i was sick. in 2004, i was working as a documentary film producer. i wasn't making a lot of money but i knew that keeping up my health insurance was a priority. i was afraid that i would break my arm snowboarding or take a

fall at work. i picked up the phone and i said, i would like to buy some health insurance, please. and this is the outcome. i ended up almost $100,000 in debt after being diagnosed with breast cancer. having surgery and chemo therapy, radiation. so many of these things, i put them on my credit card. i thought, if i don't die i'll deal with it later. i pay around $1800 a month toward all my debt related to my illness. both the tens of thousands of dollars that i paid because my insurance didn't cover me. and then, the not being able to work. i had this great plan. but if i went back on the open market and tried to buy myself health insurance. i have a pre-existing condition.

once you've had cancer i could never go out and buy the same crumby coverage that i had before. i would be denied. i'm a determined person. and overcoming cancer, i felt has been my mission for the last couple of years. and getting out of debt, i guess, is another one. and this bankruptcy seemed like a cop-out. and i don't cop out on stuff. i hope i'm alive to see the day i'm out of debt. you know? i'm 36 years old. >> we're glad to see she's healthy. it's back to school for kids. are they ready to manage ey their -- i guess i should say, your money when you're not around?te you can go back to school for less, right here. save money. live better. walmart. savings is so important to our customers. i want to give them a card that's going to be useful in their wallet. we have a program right now called add it up.

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as parent this may be your favorite time of year. back-to-school time. how to teach your kids the abc's of money. it's janet from washington. >> i want to start with the kids really at risk and these are college students and i want to show our viewers some numbers. average college student has something like $3,000 in credit card debt which is insane

because most of them have little or no income. what do you do to encourage the college students to be responsible in their money behavior? >> i'm a believer that cash is king, especially for college kids, when you send your kids off to college they need to learn how to manage a cash account, a checking a count with a debit card so they don't overdraw the account. that's the best way to teach financial responsibility and they don't need a credit card. >> wait. isn't that controversial? no credit card? don't they need to learn to use it by having one? >> i think they need to learn to use a credit card because they need to learn cash first. i have a kid going back to college this weekend. >> i bet they are not happy? >> i gave him, he'll be a junior this year. he's been managing his money with two checking a counts at home and school for two years now. he's done a wonderful job. i told him that he has my permission, if he wishes to

apply tore a credit card. he'll be 21 next month. he's proven himself. i have great faith in him and you know what? he's probably not going to do it because he says that it would be too easy for him to spend money. >> wow! tough love works. there you go. but there are new rules coming out when it comes to credit cards and college students. they want to limit the available. do you think kids will just get more offeringings in mail? the card offerings will happen off-campus instead of un-campus. >> it's hard to tell how this will pan out. i think a lot of kids will try to get in under the wire before the 21 rule kicks in in february. i think that might happen. i don't know -- we still don't know what kind of marking there's going to be to kids. i think it is important for parents to talk about credit with their kids. even talking about it, we see from surveys, kids are less likely to get cards and less likely to run up bills if their parents talk to them about credit. >> let's talk about high school kids for a second.

you say something really interesting, i think. you say a lot of kids are offered were parents are offered prepaid debit cards or debit cards for kids in high school. you say, don't do it. why? >> well, the prepaid cards, i think, again, kids need to have some responsibility managing their own money. if they had had a summer job, for example, i like the idea of having them -- them having their own checking account so they can get used to balancing the account and not overdrawing it. prepaid cards with work but there are two major problems. often there are a lot of fees attached so parents need to be aware of how much it will cost. it might be cheaper to have a regular checking account. the way the prepaid cards are often marketed is, when you run out of money, mom and dad can top off the account. that's not the point. that doesn't teach you're responsible money. so the idea is, i've seen this because i get them at work. at kip linger i get a lot of press releases that say, hey,

you need that new shirt at the gap and you don't have enough money? mom and dad can just put the money in your account. >> not so much. there's a big debate about allowance. when you give it. when you don't. what it's for. what's your recommendation. >> my recommendation and i go into this a lot, allowance is really good for younger kids who don't have income of their own. it's a way of getting money into their hands and the critical thing is, they have to make decisions about how to spend the money. not extra money that you just give them on top of everything else you're already buying for them. you give them financial responsibilities that go with the money. >> and your advice, half their age is the amount you give them? >> that's a base allowance. i'm often asked but obviously it varies from parent to parent or family to family, start with a weekly allowance equal to half the child's age, parents have to feel good about the number. as kids get older i can expand that based on what you expect those kids to pay for, way for

middle school kids should be trips to the mall. >> janet, very sensible advice. thank you very much. >> my pleasure, gerri, as always. students are flooding college campuses and if you don't think you can make the college bill here's your last minute guide if. you haven't filled out your federal application for student loan aid, you still have time. if you qualify for the stafford loan or plus loan you'll still get your money. most scholarships are probably gone but look for scholarships and grants so you can get a head start on next year's aid. ask about installment plans. more and more colleges are allowing them to pay their tuition in small increments. for a fee of $50 to $100 you can spread out the payments if you don't have to pay interest. if your family has had an unusual hardship since filing your taxes, you lost your job or your salary was cut, you acan apply for a professional judgment review. your fasa can be changed to

reflect the hardship and you can qualify for more government aid. and ask your your employees tuition assistance program. from college-age kids to your little ones, helping kids make sense. joining me now is my friend, elmo. good to see you again. >> good to be here. >> can we take a listen to a song from a show? >> kwo. ♪ if we have love we have each other ♪ ♪ we got everything we need ♪ friends and family

the folks at "sesame street" recognize the tough economic times many families are face so they dedicate aid new primetime special called "families standing together" to help parents talk to kids about finances. joining us to chat ant it is our favorite furry three and a half year old, elmo. >> hi. >> and this is a personal finance author and a part of the special. you guys are both working on it

so thanks for being here. >> thanks for having us, gerri. >> let's start with jeanne. she needs to tell us about the special. what the lessons are. says "sesame street" is never shying away from anything. >> "sesame street" said they needed a wear to engage with their children and didn't have answers for their questions so we explore the scenarios of four different families going through a variety of tough times, real families, who were brave enough to come on and tell their stories and try to give them a language to help them work through it. >> that's a great idea. elmo, i want to ask you, your family has had some tough times? right? what happened? >> elmo's mommy lost her job. which was kind of sad to elmo but elmo was also happy because mommy was around a lot more. >> that's nice sb so there was an upside to the downside.

>> and she got a new job, too. >> fantastic. that's great. so you kind of benefitted both ways? >> yeah. >> and elmo learned a lot of lessons through the experience. you had a tough time knows when you needed something versus when you wanted something. >> right. so the things elmo needed and i wanted to ask them like instead of toys and stuff like that, elmo got to learn that it was more important with the things that you need. like food and clothes. clothes because elmo doesn't wear that much clothes. >> maybe mommy does. you know what, it's really about starting that conversation in the first place, jean. how do you sit down with your elmo at home and say, you know, let's talk about money? >> you just put it out there. and you talk not so much about the dollars and cents of it, as the concept, especially when your kids are as young as elmo. you talk about the fact that mommy or daddy lost a job and you don't have as much

resources, as much money in the way of resources coming into the family. and that means we all have to work together to make some choices, and we may not be able to go out to dinner as often as we were before. we may not be able to take as many vacations a year. but you know what, we are going to have some great times having a picnic in the backyard. >> and elmo's mommy and daddy stay home and watch movies on tv instead of going out to the movies. >> and so you hung out together. >> yeah, really cool. >> that's nice. >> so do you share all information, jean, or just -- >> you have to be careful. my mother put it well to me. she is a long-time educator and she said, pay attention to the questions that children ask you, and answer those questions. but don't give them more information than they're actually asking you for because they are very attuned to how much they can actually understand. so pay attention to what they're saying and then give them enough to make them feel okay. that's the most important thing. your kids want to know you're

going to be there to love them and be okay. >> that's an important lesson. you know, we're going to talk about more lessons in just a second. how to sit down and budget as a family. you're going to help us, aren't you elmo? >> oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. >> excellent. we'll be right back. >> okay.