I may be a bit unusual as a diabetes patient.

I am 78 year old, MD PhD and a Professor.

I am also a type II diabetic who is grateful for my DEXCOM glucose monitor,

But, in my state, Washington, that pretty much means having to buy the DEXCOM G6 from a “medical Device Provider” … Byram.

My experiences with Byram have been horrible.

I will not use the meter if I need to get it from Byram.  They endanger my health by making it difficult to get the
supplies I need for this DEXCOM system.

Byram charges my insurance about three times what the same DEXCOM costs retail at COSTCO. 

I thought I might be alone until I looked at some YELP entries. Among over 200 entries (see below), I found only one rating that was not at a single star and several that complained there was no way to give no stars.

My experience began about three years ago when my physician, a superb diabetologist and good friend, called to tell me that the state insurance company would now allow me to buy a Dexcom. He was excited as was I.

Next thing I knew. I received a bizarre letter from “Byram.”  I had never heard of Byram so I was surprised that the letter was addressed to me as if I were THEIR patient!

Moreover, , the letter said I was going to be relinquishing my HIPAA rights so that Byram could access my medical records.

GET THIS!  HIPPA IS THE FEDERAL LAW THAT SAYS ONLY
THE PATIENT HAS THE RIGHT TO WHO SHARES MEDICAL INFORMATION!

As an MD, I was shocked. Since when could anyone but me choose a provider? And, other than filling my prescription what was “Byram” going to do?

Matters got worse when I looked Byram up on the web. Apparently “Byram” claims to offer patient services. So, I looked for where I might get these services. Their website gave an address near my home. Great! Except, my wife and lived near a tough part of town.  I did try to visit the Byram office.  It was for a vacant lot!

I called Byram. They denied what I could see with my own eyes ..But worse, they became abusive. I received a phone call from a Byram rep who insisted he did have the right to my records. When I tried to explain HIPPA to him, this schmendrick (sorry, I am Jewish) threatened to sue me for slander if I wrote about the vacant lot or other slurs. I explained WA state slander law to him but that did not make him any calmer. I did offer to talk to a Byram attorney but none ever called.

I could go on and on. With a LOT of help from my physician’s office, we managed to get Byram to begin shipping sensors and transmitters … except sometimes. Sometimes they did not. ship .. always finding someone else to blame. Either my doc the government policies, or in some cases me.

So this last time,  my transmitter expires. When I went to install the new one I found I had no replacement. I called Byram assuming I was due for an automatic replacement. NOPE. They had canceled shipments to me because, apparently, they had not been paid for transmitter they sent me last July! They say, they could not get paid by my insurance because Byram was  were unable to access my medical  records!

If I had not called I would not have known I was in trouble.

I would have run out of transmitters and sensors! With help from my insurance company and on my own I have looked for a different source. The insurance company recommends Edgepark and I am talking wiht them. In the mean time, I am talking with Costco. They can not sell DEXCOM under the insurance because, ya know!, the things is a “device.”  … Apparently my plain old glucose meter with finger sticker is not a “device.?”  Anyhow Costco does sell the DEXCOM even without insurance.

The price at COSTCO for sensors or transmitters? !/3 the price Byram is charging my insurance company. I am now working with my insurance to see if I can get reimbursed . In fact, given the ridiculous price that Byram has negotiated, I may end up not having a copay!

POSTS FROM YELP

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Alexandra W.
Seattle, WA
\10/17/2019
For Diabetic Patients: Do yourself a favor and do not work with this company unless it is your only option for CGM sensors, CGM transmitters and insulin pump supplies. I recommend you try to get these supplies through pharmacy benefits instead if you have the option just to ensure you have reliability in getting supplies, even if it costs you more out of pocket.

I used Byram for my CGM supplies for almost three years. Their computer systems and supply chain are unreliable. In that time they sent shipments to the wrong address, sent supplies late and were out of stock on some occasions. This doesn’t work for people who need medically necessary equipment.

The biggest reason to stay away is because they are predatory in nature. When I decided to leave so I could get my supplies through pharmacy benefits they gave me a difficult time. I called and requested to be taken off of auto-reordering. This didn’t happen and they sent a box, and my insurance got charged for CGM supplies I could no longer use (as the supplies were for the previous CGM model). They have a No Allowances return policy for all diabetic supplies so you cannot return the supplies and have the charges reimbursed. It took me calling, my insurance company calling on my behalf, me getting statements in written email from them and me sending multiple responses via email to them to say simply “I do not authorize you to send or charge me for anymore medical supplies.”

The crazy part was the predatory marketing that occurred even after getting confirmation that they were not allowed to do business with me anymore. They called me several times and tried to sign me up for auto-reordering again via SMS texts. It was relentless for 3-4 months and has finally stopped. I went so far as to remove my financial and health insurance off of their website to ensure it wasn’t sitting there waiting for them to simply authorize again.

TL:DR Stay away!
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Johanna N.
Seven Bar North, Albuquerque, NM

1/8/2020 These people suck! Account shows insurance will pay 100% and i have a $0.00 copay for my pump which came with a months worth of supplies, and then any reorder. Now they want me to pay $6,000 for the pump and first months of supplies and the supplies i ordered later, oh yeah and now they are sending federal people after me
because i won’t pay the bill, they won’t fill my auto refill which should have happened last week. Changed my doctor in my account and won’t change it back(never seen the doctor they changed it too.)
Guess i will be calling my insurance company, seeing if they will do anything or allow me to change suppliers, and possibly using the rest of my pump supplies and then back to shots if i can’t get my insulin pump supplies, the pump makes my life 10x easier but at least i have the option to do shots if i need to I’m fed up with Byram though.

DO NOT USE THESE PEOPLE!
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Van R.
Seattle, WA

7/12/2019 These people are the worst. Try and work something out with them and they give you one set of requests for what you need to get from your health insurance company and then when you have the insurance company call they change the goalposts and say they can’t honor it.

I’m diabetic and they send me a 90 day supply of CGM sensors and then refuse to ship until the 90th day for the next order despite my insurance company calling them and saying it’s ok to ship earlier. So I go without in between.
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Kay B.
Reading, MA

12/30/2019
I am VERY pleased with Byram Healthcare! NO business is perfect, BUT if there is an error, it’s fixed immediately, that is what customers remember. I have made mistakes, and I asked Byram for their help, again was fixed immediately. Customer service is great, they recap the order. I would rather speak to CS than book online. Byram follows-up with an Email, so you know when your shipment is arriving, sometimes earlier than the estimated arrival date. Thank you Byram Healthcare!! You are doing GREAT!!

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Kathryn A.
Bronx, NY

7/17/2019
Incompetent and inconvenient, frankly. I ordered my breast pump from Byram, through United Healthcare. United Healthcare only allows pumps to be processed and shipped 30 days before your due date, which made me nervous since my first baby was almost three weeks early. However, Byram processed and shipped my order immediately as soon as we were 30 days out – so far, so good!

But when the pump arrived, it was the wrong pump! I called immediately and was told that they would email me a return shipping label, I would send back the wrong pump, and only then would they send the correct pump… and if I did it wrong, I’d be charged $300 for getting two pumps.

When they sent me the prepaid label, it had no barcode that the post office could scan to confirm I’d dropped it off. Of course, the prepaid label was also for “parcel post,” the cheapest rate, which can take up to *14 business days.* By the time they receive and process the pump they sent in error, let alone send me the correct pump, my baby will likely have been born. So much for getting my pump set up and ready early!

To top it off, they also sent me the shipping label for some poor woman named “Sarah” who would have been without her label had I not notified them of their error. I don’t know this Sarah but I feel we are forever connected in the sisterhood of dissatisfied pump recipients.

I hope the rest of my experience will be smooth, and that my new baby won’t have the same medical issues as my first did that required exclusive pumping in the first few weeks. But for now, the experience has been terribly inconvenient and anxiety producing. I’m very disappointed with their service. They should move heaven and earth to fix their mistakes when they impact their customers’ health. Instead, they acted like this happens all the time and could hardly be bothered to fix it.

UPDATE: My correct pump came today, even though I can’t imagine they have received the one I returned. Now all that remains is hoping and praying that my returned pump will arrive without being lost in the mail. It’s an exercise in trust, that’s for sure.

James S.
Walla Walla, WA

10/28/2019 I agree with the previous negative comment because my experience with the company is that they do not have enough customer service employees; their web site is broken so that you can’t easily place an order if fact it won’t let you place the order at all! You go through a lot of stuff and get to the “Place my order” step and the simple click of the button causes NOTHING.So now for another time-wasting phone call.

James W.
San Francisco Bay Area, CA

Customer service reps don’t care and sound overworked and underpaid. I placed an order, which was not approved by my insurance and this company never notified me, I had to chase them down. Get your act together!

You can tell by the attitude of the reps, that they don’t care about customers.

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Maria B.
Portland, OR

9/25/2019
Terrible company. I have medicare and Medicaid and am a QMB also. Unless I am wrong it is illegal and against federal law to Try to make me pay 450 dollars . They charged medicare EIGHT dollars a Cath and Medicare paid 1600 . Thankfully I didn’t need to use Cath until now so I have a months supply . They shouldn’t be allowed to deny a very sick person their medical supplies . They called me 3 or 4 times a day trying to get me to reorder supplies. I finally put their number on call blocking . At all hours too. Bill Medicaid for the rest of the bill. Take a look at their financial hardship form. I bet no one gets that . I am a nice person and I would pay them 20 or 30 a month if they were nice about it . Allegro medical has supplies for 60 percent cheaper .

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Jon V.
Santa Monica, CA

9/24/2019 This company is poorly planned and poorly executed! Good luck dealing with the call center rejects who create whatever story flies into their heads when your order is “lost” or “in process” or “waiting on insurance approval” and when you ask to speak with a supervisor they usually say something along the lines of ” well, why would you want to do that?” They are pleasant but similar to your kid who got caught in the cookie drawer. Jeez!

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Todd M.
Kansas City, MO

2/8/2019 This is the absolute WORST company I have ever dealt with. I was forced into using them via our insurance carrier. Wait times on their phone system are always 30m+. The last TWO orders have been shipped to an address I don’t live at that is 4hrs away from my current address. This is DESPITE calling these people via phone, speaking with a customer service rep and specifically giving them the new shipping address. Just spent $2k with them and they can’t even get the shipping straight.

ABSOLUTE JOKE OF A COMPANY! DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME WITH THEM!
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Tammi L.
Queen Creek, AZ

9/12/2019 If I could give negative stars I would! I should have looked at the companies reviews prior to ordering my breast pump! After giving the company all of my insurance information they assured me that the breast pump would be covered through my insurance. I received the breast pump rather quickly. I opened it assuming that everything had been taken care of through the insurance company only to receive a bill three months later stating The insurance company did not cover the breast pump and I owe $152. Mind you this is a $75 breast pump at Walmart. I have since filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau to remove these charges. This place is a complete scam and after reading all the reviews I’m shocked that they are still in business. They have very shady business practices! Do not walk, run from this place. Buy a used breast pump if you have to but avoid Byram at any cost!
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Deborah F.
Burbank, CA

11/13/2019 This is the worst company that I have ever dealt with. I have been waiting for weeks for them to help me get my CGM supplies. They were suppose to fax something to my doctor and didn’t and things got delayed because they don’t do their job properly. Now I am out of supplies and no-one answers my call back after I left voicemails. Their e-mail address is invalid. I could go on and on. Run away from them and find another supplier. If I could give them a negative 1 i would.

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Brenda G.
Houston, TX

6/5/2019 Question everything they tell you. They assured me that my insurance will cover the equipment and it did not. Good thing I did not open the package, but even then, it took a lot of work and time for me to make them let me return it. They only give 15 days to return the equipment, but they didn’t even find out my insurance would not cover until 20 days after i received it. (So how would I know that I would have to return it). And even after they allowed me to return everything, they kept billing me for it, and there I go AGAIN tracking them down trying to get it fixed. WORSE company ever. The representatives DO NOT CARE.

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Dustin F.
Cleveland Heights, OH

4/11/2019 Basically, if there is an issue with insurance, all responsibility depends on you to solve the problem. These guys are just here to collect money and leech of the healthcare system making your supplies more expensive. What a waste of a company.
Useful 10 Funny Cool

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Ellen B.
Tucson, AZ

10/18/2019 Sent a shipment of feeding tube formula that thankfully my son noticed was expired. When I called to complain, they sent a replacement order, which was also expired! Have asked to speak to a supervisor 5 times, always promised she will call. Still haven’t been able to talk to her. So many problems I have now pledged to call them daily until they submit the dr’s prescription to our insurance. So sad that or insurance requires us to work with this company!!!

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C C.
Somerville, TX

9/25/2019 Beware. Just having to deal with this company makes living with a debilitating medical condition so much worse. They do not understand or respect the fact that they have taken on the responsibility to provide people with the medical supplies needed to live. Every month is a different excuse – item is out of stock (even though I order it from them every month), they never requested updated information from the doctor and never told me it was needed or that my order would be delayed, etc. Meanwhile, customers go without life-sustaining supplies and have no recourse except to complain to an ineffective, uncaring representative. I honestly don’t know how they sleep at night.

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Laurel C.
Hollywood, FL
35 friends
9/13/2019
This is the worst company ever, they don’t care in the least about the customers. I’m surprised they are in business. Customer service is a joke.

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George D.
Magnolia, TX

5/15/2019
They call continuously. Junk calls in the middle of the night. You will get reported if you don’t stop!
Junk company!

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David Z.
Naperville, IL7/3/2018
20 min. on hold – call got dropped – they put in notes I hung up – obviously didn’t.
Another 20 min. on hold – explained I requested new G6 back in May.
They sent G5 instead and won’t take back.
Said they already billed my insurance and even if they took it back I couldn’t get another 3 month supply because they billed already.
They are obviously trying to get rid of their older G5 supplies.
If you can get supplies from anyone else – I would!
Useful 12 Funny Cool
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James W.
Complete incompetence. No care or concern for customers. Representatives have no clue or concern for customer requests or experiences. Order status or progress is frequently incorrect.
Report this company to BBB.
Useful Funny Cool

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Bradley A.
Olympia, WA

If I could give less than 1 star rating I would. My mother in law gets diabetic supplies. They are late on shipments and she calls in to speak with a supervisor and the phone and they wont let her. I know for a fact that they have a supervisor. They said they dont have one and they can call back the next day. That doesnt get my mother in laws important diabetic supplies to her quicker. She needs them by wednesday and they now say 5 days to ship. She needs them shipped quicker. This is people’s lives. Get your stuff together to get stuff here on time so that people dont need to talk to supervisors that you guys say dont exist…
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Jessica M.
Ross, OH

This is the WORST possible company to have to do business with. If you have to place an order over the phone, be prepared to be on hold for a long, long, long time. You’re best if you can do things online (clearly what they prefer) but if you have to call (which I had to) you’ll experience long waits and rude staff. To pay a bill and order new supplies, I was on the phone for over 40 minutes. And the staff act completely bothered and miserable to be talking with you. I soooo wish my insurance didn’t dictate that I had to use them for my supplies. I would go anywhere else, but I’m stuck. I seriously thought about changing CGM’s so I wouldn’t have to use Byrum Healthcare. They’re horrible.
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Jason S.
Cedar Rapids, IA

Here is my unfortunate history with this company:

March 20: I placed an order for DexCom transmitters.

March 23: I received my order for DexCom transmitters (22599720).

(All is good so far!)

March 31: I received an email notification with a FedEx tracking number for an order I did not place.

(Not good.)

April 1: I emailed Byram about receiving notification of a FedEx tracking number for an order I did not place.

April 3: A Byram rep replied to me: “I have forwarded your concern onto my manager, I believe it was a sensor order placed by our new accounts team in error but I will have her investigate further and reach out to you.” (She never reached out to me.)

April 4: I received the box for the order I did not place. I emailed Byram, asking what it wanted me to do with the shipment.

April 5: A Byram rep replied: “I will let you know as soon as I hear back from Management.” (She never let me know.)

April 25: I emailed Byram: “I continue to hold a box containing a shipment I did not order. According to an explanation of benefits I received from my insurance company, you submitted it to my insurance company. Please let me know what I should do with the box.” (No one ever responded to this message.)

May 6: I emailed Byram, again inquiring as to instructions for returning the shipment it sent me that I did not order. (No one ever responded to this message.)

May 22: I called Byram’s customer service department. The person I spoke with informed me she would investigate the issue and call me back. (She never called me back.) In the mail that day I received the invoice for the order I did not place.

May 27: I received a “final notice” statement, stating an amount due for the order I did not place, even though I had received the invoice for that non-order just five days prior.

May 28: I emailed the statement to Byram: “We received the attached ‘final notice’ statement yesterday concerning the order we did not place. Please remove this ‘amount due’ and provide instructions on how you would like us to send back the package you sent us that we did not order.” (No one replied to me.)

May 31: I called and spoke with a different person in Byram’s customer service department. After I explained to her the situation, she informed me that Byram would have to listen to the recorded message in which I placed my order back in March. I said that was fine and asked how long that would take. She stated it would take a couple of days and then she or someone else would get back to me. (No one ever got back to me.)

June 17: I finally received the invoice for the one order (22599720) I did place. I promptly sent in payment for it.

June 23: I received a statement showing payment on both orders as due.

June 27: I give up and send payment for the order I did not place (I’ll be able to use the product several months from now), along with a letter requesting the closing of my account.
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Peter S.
New York, NY

Shockingly incompetent company. Shipments are delayed, sent to the wrong address, customer service is brutal, website was only recently updated to a 21st century standard. Customer service is unreachable weekends and holidays, not available 24/7.

For a health care provider, the level of service is completely unacceptable. Unfortunately, it’s insurance’s choice to work through them, not mine, but if I can ever get my supplies elsewhere, I will.
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Sydney K.
New Cumberland, PA

I have created a Yelp account specifically to give this company a terrible review. If you have any other option for healthcare supplies, go with that because I can guarantee it is better than Byram. I have been trying to set up a payment plan for over two months now. They said they could not debit my bank account until I had signed a form and sent it back. Ok so I signed the paper I got in the mail, put it in the prepaid envelope they sent me and put it in the mail. Over a month and nothing. I gave them a call to see what’s up and they said they never received my signed form. Ok cool. Sent it again, signed it again, mailed it again to the address in the prepaid envelope they sent me. Called over a week later to confirm receipt. NEVER GOT IT AGAIN. The lady on the phone said “it takes 3-5 days for the mail to get here” ok yeah that makes sense except for it’s been EIGHT DAYS. Then she wanted to act like I sent it to the wrong address. Nope sorry, if it was sent to the wrong address that’s your fault you sent me an incorrect envelope BOTH TIMES. And just like the last time, she wants to remind me that “I’m two months late in my payments”. Yep. I know. I don’t want to be. If this were a functional business I would have been making payments two months ago. This is just the tip of the iceberg for me with this company. They are consistently messing things up, giving me wrong information, giving my insurance company wrong information, making it 10000% harder than it has to be to get my diabetes supplies that I need to survive. No big deal. Seriously, choose another distributor.
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Eileen M. R.
Rhinebeck, NY

10/27/2017 Can I give “no star” rating? Our experience with Byram has been consistently bad. They have not hired enough staff to handle the phone calls, they do not return calls, it is impossible to speak with a supervisor. Their “process” is so dysfunctional that what would take 3 minutes to solve by making a call turns into a two month event where the “team” has to handle it. We have been promised insulin supplies that we needed that did not arrive, consistently. The staff are ill trained and their service is sub par. This has been our experience with over two years of working with them. We’ve had enough. Fortunately, there are other mail order supply companies that do a competent job.
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Jay R.
Old Tappan, NJ

8/30/2017 Very incompetent! As a user of diabetic GCM, my recently placed reorders were placed in suspense because of a change in Medicare coverage that requires completion of a form. Note that they do not begin to process an order until a 10-day supply is reached. After speaking with a customer service agent, I informed them my supplies would run out in 5 days. The agent indicated that a 30-day supply will be shipped and the Medicare form would be emailed. After 2 days of no information, I called customer service again. I was told that the shipment would be shipped that day but normal shipping (3-5 business days) was ordered despite my instruction on my most recent order to pay for expedited shipping. Now with Hurricane Harvey creating havoc with FedEx shipping, there is no telling when the supplies will reach me. This is a totally unacceptable condition and recommend that an alternative supplier be used, if possible.
Useful 6 Funny Cool

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Kurt v.
Houston, TX

10/9/2016
Zero stars are more appropriate. Bryam obtained my insurance information from my home nursing service in the Houston suburbs. I never gave either the nursing company permission to do this nor did I authorise the order. Days later I got a surprise call from Byram thanking me for choosing them. A day after the call I received a very large box loaded with what I found out later was 30 days of medical supplies which Byram priced at well over $400. Two weeks into my treatment my doctor charged the protocol but the nursing service never notified Byram as the supplies piled up, unused. When I got a bill from Byram I called their billing department to protest the surplus and ask how to return them. After nearly 25 minutes on hold Byram told me their policy is no returns after 45 days. They said I could appeal the situation with their Customer Service department, then transferred me. Another 10+ minute period of being on hold. Customer Service told me they could NOT help and, without asking, transferred me back to Billing. On hold for a third time, I hung up.
Using Bryam’s original invoice I calculated I am sitting on over $160 in unused medical supplies, including 29 rolls of gauze.
My Medicare HMO left me with a $50 co-pay on Byram’s inflated bill which, of course, I have no intention of paying. Both Byram and my nursing home healthcare service are flirting with complaints to the local BBB as well as the State Attorney General.
Shoddy secretive service and grossly inept billing & customer service departments. Zero stars. Definitely NOT recommended. Avoid Bryam like the plague.
Useful 4 Funny Cool

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Mary T.
Orangeburg, NY

12/4/2017
The one star I gave them is one star too many. I should have read these reviews before I started ordering from them. I ordered diabetic supplies which is normally covered by insurance but my last order was rejected due to how it was submitted which is not surprising because they also screwed up the order when I got it. When I called Byram they were extremely rude and totally unhelpful. The girl insisted that I needed to straighten it out with the ins co and wouldn’t even speak to me about it. It was the way they submitted the claim and she refused to even have a conversation with me in order to correct it. In fact she was rude from the moment she picked up the phone like she clearly didn’t want to be there. Why did she even answer the phone if she didn’t want to work? If this company wants to stay in business they need to get rid of the dead wood and start training their people properly. That’s the last order they got from me.
Useful 7 Funny Cool

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Dave K.
Chicago, IL

12/23/2013
First to Review Absolutely miserable experience.

This company was told NOT to send supplies to my mom. Moreover, it kept demanding a signature so that it could bill my mom’s insurance for supplies that she never received. When my mom didn’t provide a signature, they threatened to send her name to collections. After I requested assistance from our state’s Attorney General’s office, Byram magically backed off.