Learn to Get Patients to Actually Pay Their Portion

Learn to Get Patients to Actually Pay Their Portion

According to ACA International, 29 percent of adults have medical debt or trouble paying medical bills. From these numbers, it’s apparent that something needs to be done to improve patient collections.  The average American has 12 creditors (mortgage, phone, car, etc.)

Historically, practices have not aggressively pursued patient balances and half of patients have not paid their portion by 60 days.

Listen, it’s only going to get worse, unless you figure this out.

These are the facts…

1. Doctors have lived off mostly insurance money for decades
2. Insurance reimbursements are plummeting yearly
3. This downward trend won't be changing anytime soon
4. The patients owe the remaining balance
5. Most patients haven't been paying their portion for years
6. Practices are losing money every single month
7. To survive, doctors have been cutting staff and borrowing
8. This is not working, and is clearly not sustainable
9. With the Exchanges, HDHP, and ICD-10, it is only going to get worse

Some physicians are making the often times drastic switch to nontraditional payment programs in hopes of a remedy. But there are ways to improve patient collections while avoiding dramatic changes for your practice.

Here are a few tips to help increase receivables.

“Address Correction Requested"

• Did you know that the USPS will give you an updated address for less than $.75?
• Print “Address Correction Requested” on all your envelopes and if a customer has moved, you can get the updated address from the post office. It’s a very inexpensive way to keep your files updated and reduce the amount of time and money it takes for skip tracing.

Fees – Hassle or benefit? 

• If you are going to charge late fees, remove the 1.5%-2% late payment fees. A flat late fee is much easier to manage than a percentage of balance.
• Stop offering discounts to customers who pay late and take a discount. Have you ever received a check from a customer that was late, and they still took a discount for paying on time? If this occurs often, get rid of the discount. Why should you offer a discount for something they should pay for as agreed?

Communicate a deadline

• Respond within X days or “consequence.”
• Is there a due date on your bill or do you just show the date the bill was generated?
• Many bills do not show a specific due date which implies that payment is due whenever the patient feels like paying.
• Are penalties specified for violating terms? Is there any consequence to paying late?
• Why not include a late charge in order to give your bill priority over other bills, which don’t incur penalties? A flat late fee is much easier to manage than a percentage of balance.

Learn to Get Patients to ACTUALLY Pay Their Portion!

Want to learn how…

• A OBGYN group DOUBLED their cash-flow in just 6 weeks?
• An internal group is getting 60% from their 10-month old delinquent accounts?
• How 2 surgeons got $93,000 in the past year in past-due accounts?