Three Ways To Avoid Nonpayment From Your Patients
Posted on: 10 August 2015
Even if you are the best doctor in your area, your business cannot survive without efficiently collecting money from patients. This means following some methods for preventing patient accounts from going into collections and making sure that they pay what they owe. This will allow your business to thrive and remain viable for years. With this in mind, use the points explained below so that your medical business can thrive.
Always Check, Verify And Copy Your Patients' Insurance Cards
You need to verify a patient's information each and every time they receive service, in the same way that a police officer asks for license and registration upon every single visit. Following this procedure and training your staff to do so, even if a patient has been with you for 50 years, will drastically reduce nonpayment issues. This allows you to check whether the patient's insurance is still valid and make a copy of their insurance information for your records. Never skip this step, because identity theft is on the rise and you always need to keep your records clean and thorough.
Provide A Plethora Of Payment Options
The more options you give your patients for paying, the easier it will be to collect money from them. To make sure that your business thrives, accept every major credit card and always have a backup system in place if you are not able to run a card the traditional way. Make it easy for patients to pay online and with cell phone apps, so they have every reason to remember that their bill is due and to handle it accordingly. You can also invest in a system that provides friendly reminders to patients, rather than relying on traditional snail mail, which is easy to ignore.
Let Your Patients Know About Your Three Strike Policy
The only way for your policies to mean anything is if you actually enforce them. The best rule of thumb to follow is the three strike rule. If you have made contact with the patient reminding them about their bill at least three times, it is time to take further action. Having this policy in place will allow you to avoid back and forth issues and will make sure that all of your clientele is serious about payment.
Use these three quick tips, no matter what type of medical business to run, so that you can streamline the process of receiving payment and avoid issues. If you do run into issues, contact a company like Alacrity Collections Corporation for assistance.
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