Challenges related to patient payment collection have been affecting more than 45% of dental practices across the US. Providers consider past due balances to be a major hindrance in running a practice smoothly.
Difficulties in collecting patient payment:
Lack of training:
- If the staff members aren’t trained in AR, collections or financial management, your dental practice will face challenges in ensuring high collection rates
- Inefficiency of the in-house staff in collection of patient payment can result in loss of approximately 4% of all production on patients who don’t pay their bills ultimately
- Majority of staff members lack the willingness to follow-up with patients constantly in order to get payments. At times, to create a positive patient experience, they avoid “hounding” patients for payment
Time constraint:
- Due to rising pressure caused by healthcare reforms, in-house staff at dental practices has been burdened with medical billing and coding complexities, HIPAA and other vital tasks. This has left them with less or no time to enhance collection rate
- There has been a significant increase in number of patients seeking dental services. Dentists are spending more time attending patients and less time on ensuring high collection rates or training staff to handle the same
Is there a need to seek help from a collection agency?
The above-mentioned challenges have made it difficult for providers to get patients pay on time. When balances grow out of control, many providers seek help from a collection agency; however, this is not always the best solution.
20% is the average recovery rate of delinquent funds in the debt collection industry. Typically, 30-40% of a collected total is taken by such agencies as commission. In such cases, providers are left with 12% of balances they place under the service of the collection agent. The costs are high and at times, the level of public relations is so bad that your practice might lose patients.
How can outsourcing help?
Why put the reputation of your dental practice at risk? Necessary measures should be taken to train staff in handling patient payment collection procedure with precision. Providers will also have to keep track of the collection process on regular intervals to ensure their staff is carrying out the task effectively. However, considering the lack of time and money, many dentists are seeking help from a dental billing service to sail through collection challenges.
Medicalbillersandcoders.com is the largest consortium of billers and coders in the US, helping practices enhance revenue collection. Our team is not only experienced in handling dental billing requirements but also offers effective solutions to put your account receivables in order. MBC has been minimizing administrative workload of dental practitioners across 50 states in the US, helping them eliminate the headache of hiring and training staff in billing and payment collection services.
Our aim is to offer you ample time to focus on effective patient care while our team micromanages tasks related to revenue cycle management.