With the increasing prevalence of High Deductible Health Plans (HDHP) and other aggressive patient cost-sharing models, it has never been more important to the financial health of your practice to have an efficient patient pre-collections program in place.
Fee schedules are getting reduced every year. This means if you’re not on top of your patient collections at all times, revenue will be lost.
At MEREM Healthcare Solutions, one thing we know for sure is that poor revenue cycle management can be disastrous for a practice. The codes required for obtaining maximum revenue payout for billing medical claims are constantly changing, which brings numerous challenges for coders in an already busy practice. The coding and reimbursement landscape continues to change.
Impacts of High Deductible Health Plans
Due to patients having more responsibility for their healthcare costs, High-deductible health plans have a significant impact on your bottom line, from patient collections to bad debt.
You must also add in additional labor costs for the time required for your staff to focus on the collections side. Your billing process can no longer be something that gets a couple of hours of attention a day, it will constantly evolve and requires a dedicated staff or team to file and consistently work claims as well as dedicate additional time speaking with patients to discuss coverage and out-of-pocket costs.
Medical Billing and Coding – Let MEREM Health Help
With the increasing prevalence of High Deductible Health Plans and other aggressive patient cost-sharing models, it has never been more important to the financial health of your practice to have an efficient patient pre-collections program in place.
With a typical Medical Billing company, their patient collection efforts only go as far as issuing statements and generating “bad debt” reports of accounts that need to be turned over to collections. However, we have found that when accounts reach this point, less than 50% of these balances are ever recovered.
At MEREM Healthcare Solutions, we work with our client partners to develop a Patient “Pre-Collections” strategy that is both aggressive and fair. We work with your front office staff and management to develop a Point-of-Service (POS) collections process to effectively collect more money up-front.
Additionally, you will have the added support of a dedicated medical billing team and a patient collections representative. Our patient collections reps work diligently to collect patient balances in full or to make payment arrangements within 90 days and will help you identify and transmit delinquent accounts to a third-party collections agency of your choice.
Contact Us today to learn more about our Patient Pre-Collections Services.
Patient Pre-Collections Solutions
Our Patient Pre-Collections Solutions include:
- 20 hours of consultant time to develop your customized solution
- Statements and collection letter processing
- Managing payment plan list to ensure patients meet their terms
- Running auto-dial lists to notify patients with delinquent accounts
- Aggressive follow-up on past-due surgical balances
- Custom reports to aid in POS collection efforts
- Diligent management of third-party collections accounts
- Ongoing support from our patient collection reps and management consultants
Request an Assessment of your patient AR to see how much money you could be leaving on the table! Contact MEREM Health at (205) 329-7519 or click here to send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you!
MEREM Health provides exceptional collections and medical billing, coding and credentialing services for specialty physician practices, urgent cares, and diagnostic imaging centers. Take advantage of our medical billing and coding expertise today!