Much has been written about people getting quality medical services at reasonable prices. But just as important is medical professionals getting paid for services rendered. Becoming a medical professional is not easy or cheap, whether an individual decides to become a Registered Nurse, a Physicians Assistant, or a Doctor.
They are also under a lot of pressure to solve everyone’s physical maladies, and must spend years and years of studying before providing care.
Sometimes getting compensated for your services becomes a complicated and frustrating process.
So here are some keys to getting properly compensated for your medical services.
- Find and retain patients who are willing to pay cash upfront
- Reach out to patients who haven’t paid and offer to negotiate a payment plan
- Offer a rewards program to long-term customers
- Provide an itemized bill so patients can’t haggle over details, to avoid paying
- Make sure the patient knows all the charges up front
First
Make an effort to find patients who are willing to pay cash upfront. These are the types of patients you want coming to you for medical services. By receiving cash upfront, this eliminates what sometimes seems like an endless amount of paperwork and phone calls to get properly compensated.
Offer incentives for patients to pay upfront, like discounts for paying upfront and referrals program to other patients willing to pay cash. By getting a steady stream of customers who are willing to pay cash upfront, this will ensure that at least a portion of your services will receive prompt payment.
Second
If you have patients who are delinquent on their payments, many of them are probably hiding out because they don’t have the funds to pay the bill. Before sending their bill to collections, make an effort to reach out to them and offer to negotiate a payment plan.
If the patient sees that you’re willing to negotiate a payment plan before sending their bill to collections, you may have a better chance at receiving some compensation for your services.
Rewards Program
Besides getting patients who are willing to pay cash, also set up some sort of rewards program to long-term customers who have paid their bills on time. These are the types of customers you want to keep coming back to you, so offer a free session or a discount to them after getting a certain number of treatments. This will also help ensure that you will be getting paid for your services when working with a customer base that is able to pay bills on time.
Bill Upfront
Another way to expedite the payment process is to provide an itemized bill upfront. Patients may choose to haggle over the details of a bill they are not happy with, if they are not given an itemized list of charges, they may have grounds to dispute the bill and prolong not having to pay. So it would be a good idea for you to provide an itemized bill upfront for more intensive procedures that require larger payments.
An Extra Bill?
Also, patients often complain that they receive another bill after believing they have already paid. The extra bill is usually for test samples that have been sent out, or other tests that have been performed.
So make sure to let the patient know upfront what extra costs may be incurred by testing and provide them with a bill upfront if possible. This will increase the likelihood of getting paid for your services, instead of haggling over what the patient perceives as extra costs that they weren’t informed about.
By following the keys mentioned above, it will increase the likelihood of getting paid in a timely manner. Decreasing the amount of debt collection you will have to do, will allow you to focus your energies on what is most important, providing quality medical care to patients.
Kenneth Gray is an expert in medical billing from his time as the founder of A-Fordable Billing Solution a medical billing service for individuals and health care providers http://www.afordablebillingsolution.com.