Insurance reimbursements are decreasing and operating costs are increasing, can make it a challenging time to manage a practice. Whether your practice has decided to do billing in-house or outsource it through an agency, getting paid while maintaining a relationship with your patients can be a balancing act at times. There are definitely some things to keep in mind in a practice to ensure that your practice is getting paid while still having the patient’s best interest in mind.

For this blog series, we have laid out seven tips to assist your practice with billing to be sure you are getting paid accurately and timely!

1. Keep Detailed Documentation

While this does include all personal information, it can sometimes be the diagnosis and progress that can fall through the cracks. Be sure to always keep detailed information about the patient’s diagnosis, anything your practice provided to them, if they have seen any other physicians about the issue, progress, and duration of time spent with the patient. Everyone is involved in the documentation, so it is important to be sure that all staff members are on the same page with keeping detailed and accurate documentation.

2. File on Time

Some practices have had to learn the hard way to submit their claims in a timely manner, because it was denied by the insurance just due to the time it was submitted. Each insurance company varies on the allotment of time granted to submit a claim, this can be anywhere from 90 days to 18 months. Be sure your billing staff or agency are aware of the time per the different insurance companies so they are informed. The best thing to do is to create a fixed billing schedule for the practice to guarantee no claim is submitted late. This can be that your practice bills out every 15 days or once a month, as long as it falls within the insurance company’s window of time.

Stay tuned for Part 2 and 3 to learn more billing tips!