Health Care and Insurance are not only confusing for patients, but they are also quite the puzzle for providers. At Ponderosa, we are fully aware that providers struggle with collecting payments and knowing about deductibles or benefits. When January comes each year, deductibles reset and the confusion soars through the roof. Patients are asking questions, practitioners fail to collect payments, practices are wasting time… it’s a cycle of wasting both time and money. The confusion doesn’t only come from deductibles resetting at the beginning of each year, people just don’t understand how health care works. These stats display exactly that:
- 61% of people know the term “health care premium”
- 62% of people know the term “health plan deductible”
- 39% of people know the term “out of pocket maximum”
- 31% of people know the term “co-insurance”
Last but not least, only 9% of people know all four of the terms listed above. Clearly, there is some confusion circulating in the health care and insurance world.
How Does This Affect You As a Provider?
This confusion in the health care and insurance industry results in more stress in private practices due to the inability to efficiently collect funds and answer questions about the terms mentioned above.
Did you know…
- In 2016, US hospitals face $36 billion in unpaid costs
- 40% of providers fail to collect $31.713 per month
- 73% of providers say it takes 30 days to collect from patients
If you are a provider missing out on $31,713, this means you are missing out on funds to invest more in your practice, pay your employees, balance work and life, and much more. The problem is that people that own a private practice don’t have time to keep up with these collections. Most providers out there think that the missed collections are long gone. How can providers resolve this?
Tips for Providers (ABA, Mental, Medical) to Resolve This:
- Collect up front. Get the payment taken care of right away when your patients come in. Most will appreciate this more than receiving a bill in the mail two months later. This is the most effective way to get payments.
- Make sure your staff knows what is going on. Having your staff be trained to collect funds upfront or know the payment process is essential to increasing
your collection rate. - Save a payment method on your patient’s file. If you are completely honest
and upfront with your patient about how the payment process works, theywill have less resistance to this. - Send
an email to your patients once their payment has been processed. Thiscontributes to being direct in the payment process and helps your patients tofeel secure and confident about their payments. - Hire a billing service to help answer time-consuming questions and take care
of complicated insurance collection situations. This is a resourcefultool for your patients and an efficient tool for your practice.
Call Ponderosa today if you have additional questions about Health Care, Insurance Collections, or anything else. Ponderosa is here to support your practice.