I've been trying to figure out if there's an alternate ... game that could be played in order to find actual pricing for procedures ex post facto. My original (

I've been trying to figure out if there's an alternate ... game that could be played in order to find actual pricing for procedures ex post facto. My original (and I know this doesn't work) thought was some sort of competitive billing procedure. It would work like this: 1. After a procedure K is performed & the payee sends a request to billing for $M; 2. The payer can request "co-bids" from other sources; 3. The co-bidder "X" that bids the least/best gets the money (say, $N < $M); 4. But! "X" now guarantees to accept $N for that procedure K for the next (or some single future) procedure K they perform. Obviously, a co-bidder could bid $N for procedure K with no intention to ever perform procedure K again, amongst other nefarious things.