3 Simple Ways for Practices to Boost Collections

Want to run a profitable practice?

Then make sure you are doing something to improve patient collections. According to a survey by the ACA International, approximately 29% of adults have medical debts or difficulty in paying medical bills. It is apparent from this number that timely patient collection is vital if practices don’t want to leave money on the table.

 

In order to boost collections, there are some physicians out there making drastic changes to non-traditional payment programs.

However, there are several other low-tech ideas that can be implemented for improving billing and collections:

1. It is very important that medical billing are simple and less confusing for the patients. According to the experts, every patient wants to make sense of their medical bills. Regardless of how the bills are being delivered, patients want to understand what all services they have been charged for. If the bills are confusing and overwhelming, there are chances they will put it aside to deal with later. Therefore, it is necessary for practices to make little tweaks to the bills and strip down the invoice to basics - date of service, balance, due date for payment, number for calling with questions and so on. If the bill is easy to understand, patients are more likely to pay promptly.
2. Another effective method of bringing in more payments is to have skilled and experienced front-desk and back-office staff. If the staff is well-trained in collection practices, then it will be easier for them to explain the bills to patients along with payment policy details.
3. There is no doubt that automated calls made to patients, reminding them for payments is time saving but experts recommended calls made by staff themselves. Automated reminders save time but they can also cost practices. When a staff calls, it gives a human touch to the call and there are less chances of the call being ignored. Also, in a live call, patients can ask questions in advance to ensure that prior authorizations are complete and information is also updated.

Undoubtedly, Medical Billing and collections have become easier and more effective with technology but at times, even simple and traditional methods can also work wonders for practices. It is important for providers to hire well-trained and professional staff and invest in good collection practices so that patient experiences can be improved further.