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Law Firm Billing Software

There was a time when law firms and attorneys used to manually calculate the total billable hours and other aspects related to client projects. There are several firms that still do it manually but the good news is that now you or your firm can use billing software created specifically to handle billing by law firms. Isn't that great news?

The truth is that a law firm billing software can provide law firms across the world with time as well as billing capabilities. Whether it is for attorneys working in a small law firm or clients in medium to large law firms, a billing software can take care of most of the billing information, details, and update. The modern day software has robust features that help it to perform at high efficiency levels and thus streamline all client billing activities.

The key to a law firm's profitability is tracking as well as managing time and expenses and this is exactly what a law firm billing software has been created to do. This is a software that will provide state-of-the art technology and solution both online and offline. Most of the top companies who are marketing their software also offer customer service or technical help in case you are unable to use the software properly. The different functionalities and benefits of a law firm billing software include:

1. It is a great solution for lawyers as it offers multiple functionalities

2. The law firm billing software offers narrative replacement codes that can help you to quickly enter any frequently used descriptions

3. These software's have multiple timers that have the ability to concurrently manage time

4. It conflicts management in order to search for related parties with ease

5. You can take advantage of the Trust Accounts in case you need to manage any third party account

6. Most of the activities of the law firm billing software are coded with Uniform Task-Based Management System

7. The file format used is Legal Electronic Data Exchange Standard or LEDES 98

8. You will be able to maximize profitability due to high quality time tracking

9. It will initiate the process of quicker bill presentment and thus improve overall cash flow

10. Using the software you will be able to reduce any kind of billing disputes you're your clients or customers and will also be able to get immediate approval for your billable tasks

11. Using the billing system of the tracking software you can create a practice dashboard where you will be able to see the financial pulse of your actual business

12. Using the law firm billing software will enable your clients to make faster payment through credit cards

13. The law firm billing software will help you to keep track of total time as well as expenses offline and for this you will need to install a desktop application. The best thing is that the software is easy to use and you will get technical help from the company marketing the product.

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About Web Based Medical Billing Software

Using web based medical billing software has several advantages. One of the first ones is having instant access to all the information you need. You don't have to worry about expensive upgrades and there are no maintenance costs. You also don't have to mess with licensing fees if you have multiple users or computers using the web based medical billing software. You will have no IT costs. Because it is web-based you will be able to access your information from any computer. This software is not web-enabled it is web-native all the applications will run through your Internet browser.

The servers for this medical billing software place your data in a secure commercial facility, which uses the best data backup created. The data is all encrypted and monitored with anti-virus protection for the security. The data is secured beyond the requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. With this system you can feel at ease knowing your data is as safe as it can be and is backed up on a regular basis.

The web based medical billing software can be customized in order to suit special needs of your office. Some companies offer live training courses you can take online. Your medical billing software will always stay current because the software is updated with upgrades regularly.

With this medical billing software you will be able to manage your charts. If your office is considering paperless, you will be able to manage the change in the manner you feel most comfortable with. The templates in the system will help you get started. In most cases the system will adapt to your needs.

You will have no need for additional data entry because everything regarding the patient will be in the patient database. This will also reduce unnecessary errors in data entry process. You will have the capability of inputting data from a variety of sources. The web based medical billing software will take data you have scanned whether it is an image or a form. You will have control of the how the data is handled; you will be able to customize the data management as much as you need.

Every aspect of a patient's workup and every visit will be easy to access. The office staff will be able to assign tasks in order to speed up the care of the patient. The medical billing software will also oversee patient flow from the time a patient walks in the door until after the patient has seen the doctor and is out the door. The web based medical billing software should help reduce the time a patient has to wait by making the visits well timed and enlightening.

All-important communiqués are sent to the correct departments. Anything left undone or late will be flagged by the system. The system will also help with the physician's correspondence by making the communications more effective.

When it comes to the scheduling of patients the web based medical billing software can be a huge help. You will control every minute of your scheduling calendar. You can check your scheduling calendar by the day, week or month. Booking errors will be eliminated with the medical billing software because the software will let you know of any conflicts in scheduling.

You will be able to see the exact number of patients you have received from referrals. This will enable you to see, the results of the one versus another referral. It will be easier to keep track of insurance referrals and with the number of visits allowed the patient.

The web based medical billing software will make the office run smoother and more efficient. This medical billing software is extremely useful in the management aspect of the office.

As for the billing aspect of the web based medical billing software, your office has the option to eliminate the hassles of generating a bill to be sent to those patients requiring one. The diagnosis and the procedure codes are in the system and the charges will automatically be sent to the claims process or to a billing service. You can create and submit electronic claims quickly and easily. The medical billing software will check all the claims for errors, which will help eliminate denied claims. Buying codebooks will be a thing of the past because the coding references are already programmed in the system. You will be able to manage the claim process from any computer with an Internet connection. The collections process has been simplified for time saving benefits. With the system you will also be able to generate reports in order to locate a problem area quickly. All the reports can be sent to Adobe Acrobat or Microsoft Excel, it will be your choice.

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Relative Value Price-Performance Calculation for Outsourced Electronic Medical Billing Service

Internet-based technology has been applied effectively to reduce medical billing costs, especially at the stages of electronic submission and scrubbing. However, excess focus on reducing costs of individual process components while ignoring total billing quality exposes medical practice to significant financial downside. Quantification of billing quality and its inclusion into price-performance equation of billing service yields more comprehensive financial picture and better decisions about billing service selection and its management. Such an approach also results in substantially higher remittance and better regulatory compliance. It is effective, however, only subject to billing performance guarantees and transparency.

Traditional sequence of management steps to rationalize medical practice billing and reduce its costs requires the physician to invest in processes, personnel, and technology:

Study your denials to eliminate errors by using claims-scrubbing software
Educate your front-end employees about the billing process and know how to be a part of it
Investigate tools for electronic submission and take advantage of technology
Set guidelines for which claims and which dollar amounts merit appeals
Provide patients with clear payment policies up-front


ROI in Claim Processing Technology

For illustration, consider a case of a three-office practice with 17 internists and a patient panel of 20,000, quite similar to Potomac Physician Associates (Donato, 2003), in Bethesda, MD, who in 2002 brought their claims submission and practice management services in-house. Assuming three FTE's working the billing and using Vericle's technology, the costs would be about $120,000 for personnel and $36,000 for technology. For reference, Vericle technology performs comprehensive claim validation, patient demographics and eligibility test prior to visit, electronic claim submission, and comprehensive reporting for followup etc. Additionally, using Vericle technology, 98% of claims are now clean, adding further value for the investment in claims processing technology. In this case, billing costs add up to $156,000 annually. This is a significant accomplishment in terms of billing processing costs, because without advanced technology, the same practice may need at least seven FTE's, at cost of $280,000.

Accordingly, the previous arrangement prior to installing the Vericle technology costs at least $292,000 (assuming 1/3 of cost for an alternative albeit inferior billing package). Thus, an investment of $36,000 in superior technology saved at least $136,000, which is obviously an impressive ROI on $36,000.

However, this approach does not account for the entire spectrum of costs associated with in-house billing approach. It ignores the total revenue aspect of the billing function, which is its ultimate purpose.

Quantification of Losses Caused By Insufficient Billing Process Quality

To receive a more comprehensive perspective, let us compute the total losses of this approach generated by uncollected payments. We will proceed by establishing a convenient baseline and figuring out a way to approximate the losses.

In our experience, the likelihood of payment shrinks dramatically with time. With few exceptions, the unpaid claims for more than four months are eventually forfeited. Hence the importance of A/R beyond 120 days. Therefore, to compute the total losses we must start with computing the total revenue and then use the days in accounts receivable as a proxy for the underpayment.

For the case study in hand, we estimate the total practice revenue by assuming average physician revenue of $300,000, which, for 17 physicians, adds up to a total of $5,100,000. Next, since the stated percent of clean claims for electronic submission is about average (98%), we will also assume an average nation-wide A/R beyond 120 days, which currently stands at about 17.7% (Lowes, 2004). This number indicates that the amount of losses on the billings of $5,100,000 approaches $902,700. Even if 40% of that A/R were eventually collected, we would still face a revenue loss of $541,620 .

Therefore, while the practice saved $136,000 on personnel, it still lost an estimated $541,620 on billing quality despite the newly installed technology.

The lesson of this illustration is that the costs of billing function may be grossly underestimated because of the following common pitfalls:

Pitfall #1: Focus on costs of individual components of the billing function instead of computing the bottom line cost to the practice.

Pitfall #2: Underestimate the costs of these components such as benefits, sickness, management, replacement, education, and vacations in case of personnel costs.

Pitfall #3: Focus on the numbers or quality of claims instead of billed and paid numbers of dollars.

An alternative, bottom-line oriented approach, guarantees improved revenue before spending a dime:

Measure your current percentage of A/R beyond 120 days and assume (for the sake of conservative management) that money is lost.
Find a billing service provider with significantly higher performance levels than your own solution
Base your management decisions on total cost/performance metrics.


Price-Performance Computation

A billing service provider with guaranteed performance levels will typically charge a percentage of payments. This approach aligns the interests of the biller and of the physician and results in dramatically lower A/R beyond 120 days, often as low as 4% and even 2%.

In this case, the difference in remittance between the two approaches amounts to $463,020 or 9.08% more to the bottom line.

Note that billing quality is a key component of the billing cost computation and the decision to outsource the billing service is based on a multi-fold improvement in billing quality. Such an improvement must be so great that only a specialist-billing provider can create and maintain the required volumes and economies of scale. Therefore, one should consider outsourcing only after due diligence establishing that the billing provider delivers superior performance, the difference in performance is quantifiable and significant enough for a bottom-line growth, and such performance can be verified independently and continuously. A rule of thumb is that the new combined percentage of fees and uncollected revenue must stay below in-house A/R (billing quality measured in terms of % of billed amount in A/R beyond 120 days).

Additional Benefits of Quantitative Approach to Billing Outsourcing

Note also that by outsourcing to the right billing service provider, the practice liberates itself from multiple additional issues associated with process, personnel, and technology aspects of billing. Specifically, the only remaining billing function for the practice owners is the periodic review of cash flow and accounts receivables, in other words, an entirely bottom-line driven supervision. There is no need to micromanage the submission process, reconcile rejections, appeal to the payers, etc. Similarly, there is no more need to manage billing employee team, their vacations, sick days, benefits, teamwork, and turnover. Finally, there is no more need to deal with any technology issues, such as installation, maintenance, backups, disaster recovery, HIPAA compliance, and upgrades.

References:


S. Donato, "Three Steps to Fewer Denials. Getting Claims Management Under Control", Physicians Practice, April 2003.
R. Lowes, "Practice Pointers: How to Cut A/R", Medical Economics, September 3, 2004.

Yuval Lirov, PhD, author of "Practicing Profitability - Network Effect for Revenue Cycle Control in Healthcare Clinic and Chiropractic Office: Scheduling, SOAP Notes, Care Plans, Coding, Billing, Collections, and Audit Risk" (Affinity Billing) and "Mission Critical Systems Management" (Prentice Hall), inventor of patents in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Security, and CEO of Vericle.net - Distributed Billing and Practice Management Technologies. Yuval invites you to register to the next webinar on audit risk at BillingPrecision.com

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What Should You The Consumer Know About A Bill Consolidation Loan

Are you stressed with your huge debt and risking bad credit have you considered a Bill Consolidation Loan

A Bill Consolidation Loan is essentially a personal loan that is used to payoff or consolidate credit card debt, student loans, auto loans, so you can see in all it is used for debt and bill consolidation. Bill Consolidation Loans are for those who get buried under debt and those who use their credit cards excessively without checking their total balance and can't figure out how they will be able to pay off this debt because they only can afford to pay the minimum balance and discover there isn't any way to pay it off totally. Credit cards are easy to come by if you have good credit and easier to use if there is an available balance left, and come with relatively high interest rates that most people really don't take seriously until a late payment is made or the introductory period has ended. A bill consolidation loan will have the least impact on your credit and possibly the lowest payments, but they also will take the longest time and save you the least amount of money but it can save from having to deal with bad credit debt consolidation or a debt management program.

You dream of debt free living but because you are paying the minimum on your credit cards can create a vicious cycle. You only pay the interest on the debt charged but never manage to reduce the principal while adding new charges to the total so therefore this cycle has blinded you until it is too late. Your credit cards may not impact you but your personal debt as a whole is totally affecting your total financial outlook so how do you manage your finances better by consolidating your debts, and improve your bad credit ratings. A Bill Consolidation Loan consolidates all your outstanding bills and combines all of your debt into one payment which you can easily manage. Unlike your credit card, a consolidation loan gives you the comfort of knowing when your loan will be paid off.

What is the process for obtaining a Bill Consolidation Loan

Bill consolidation is the process where you negotiate with your creditors to consolidate your debts and reduce your monthly payments which leads to applying for a bill consolidation loan. Auto loan debt, credit card debt, secured loan debt, unsecured loan debt are all different kinds of debts that you could find your self with that can be presented debt management company who will make the decision to give a bill consolidation loan . Debt management companies can save you years on debt payments through their debt credit servies which starts with debt consolidation information passed on to your with the overall goal to allow you to get reduced rates on your debts. Now that your bill consolidation loan has been signed so the bill collectors stop the harrassment and you can concentrate on honoring your debt, with easy terms, all while you save money.

These debt management companies who know their business and will be able to give you a date when each of your accounts will be paid in full. Once the creditors realize that you have taken up a good credit help program, they get you a good concession on your monthly payments and interest rates. All you have to do is just fill out the debt management programs bill consolidation loan application and consider the advice of a debt counselor to seek out your dream of debt free living. Bill consolidation loans can be very useful for people feeling overwhelmed by their finances, but they are not for everybody and that is a decision you have to assess within yourself.

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Outsource Medical Billing Services - Should a Physician Outsource Medical Billing Services

This is a very difficult decision for any physician and partially boils down to this or her own personal ideology and comfort level.

Hospital-based physicians will almost always be better off outsourcing because of the office related expenses that they would not otherwise incur. As the owner of medical billing service you may think I'm naturally biased towards outsourcing. I can assure you that this is not the case.

Physicians who are overly controlling, uncomfortable or mis-trusting toward billing services are nearly impossible to administer. I don't want anything to do with those types of physicians but I completely respect and understand their point of view. Setting all ideology aside I would like to delve into the pros and cons of this difficult and complicated decision.

I am a physician who is very interested in the business aspect of medicine and I do not mind spending my valuable time managing the medical billing aspect of my practice.

Clearly, the best way to do your billing is to do it personally. Obviously, doing it yourself is probably not an option but if you're willing to spend the time and have the interest I would recommend that you do your own billing. Keep in mind that most billing service owners and certainly our employees have limited medical backgrounds. Physicians who study CPT, regularly attend billing seminars and keep up to date on industry changes are the ultimate medical billing gurus in my view.

I am a physician who has absolutely no time or interest in the medical billing aspect of my practice. I am completely reliant upon my office manager and billing staff.

Unfortunately, most physicians are in this position. Even if they were interested in keeping up with all the changes and elements of medical billing the practical reality is that there is absolutely no time. Let's face it; time is your most valuable asset. It's sort of like mowing your own lawn. You'd be way better off financially seeing patients for three hours on Saturday morning. I believe the following information will dramatically help with your decision to outsource your billing or continue to do it yourself and with future decisions in the ever-changing business aspect of medicine.

The pros and cons of outsourcing your medical billing services.

I would like to preface this article with a couple of obvious but important points. If you have a system of controls, keep an open mind about the competence of your office manager, you've got an excellent computer system, proper information systems and your office is doing a superb job at collecting your money, then by all means do not make any changes. Conversely if you're planning to outsource your billing make sure you hire quality firm. I'll spend some time at the end of this article discussing this further.

Most leading experts agree that it costs about 4.5% of net collections to perform the billing function within a physician's office. Incidentally, this is close to my actual cost as well.

Theoretically, a billing service should be able collect more money than a physician's office because it is our core competency. The question is how much more? This is why I focus on how to choose a billing service at the end of this article.

The numbers

A. Lets just do the math in a theoretical model.

We'll base our numbers on a practice whose total gross receivables are $100,000 per month. Obviously, this is an overly simplistic model designed to quantify the aggregate cost and or opportunity cost of the medical billing component only.

Current Aggregate Billing Expenses

In-house expense

Total gross revenue $100,000

Current billing expense $4,500

(4.5%) ---------------

Net Revenue $95,500

Outsourced Billing Expense

Total gross revenue $100.000

Current billing service exp. $7,000

(7.0% net collections) ---------------

Net Revenue $93,000

Net cost increase with outsourcing = $2,500.00

As you can see in this," all things being equal" theoretical model your practice would incur a $2,500 decrease in net revenue with the implementation of a billing outsource strategy. Keep in mind that this model does not address other less tangible issues such as your reduced payroll, computer expenses, ect. In reality the net cost could be substantially less than $2,500. Many physicians will perceive this as a small price to pay while others will consider it to be cost prohibitive.

5% theoretical increase in gross revenue with outsourced billing

Total gross revenue $105,000 (5% increase)

Billing service expense $7,350

(7% net collections) ----------------

Net revenue $97,650

$95,500 - $97,650 = $2,150.00 increase in net revenue.

As you can see from this model with a 5% increase in collections your net revenue will increase $2,150.00 with the added expense of the billing service. Keep in mind that a 5% increase in gross collections is actually quite conservative and should easily be obtainable by quality billing service.

Intangibles

B. A billing service should be able to provide you with a substantial reduction in your day-to-day aggravations such as practice management software issues, fewer employees, hassle of hiring competent employees, less health insurance, less training, ECT..ect. Conversely you will however lose some control over your practice. If the billing service does not collect more money your expenses will increase. It's up to you to determine whether or not the increased expense is offset by decreased aggravation.

security

C. A billing service should be able to increase your security levels by creating a system of checks and balances. As a former police officer I can assure you that crime statistics indicate most embezzlement/fraud/theft occurs from within. During an investigation a store manager for Sears and Roebuck Co. once told me," our customers take it out piecemeal but our employees take it out in wheel barrels" This logic also applies to a doctor's office. A billing service can provide an extra layer of protection because there is a system of independent checks and balances. Typically billing services are fairly large businesses with strict internal controls. My organization Medi-Bill Inc. Operates internally similar to a banking institution with the way we handle funds. It is highly unlikely that the ownership of a reputable medical billing firm would risk the consequences of committing fraud against a client.

Conversely, the issue once again boils down to control. Many physicians are understandably quite unsettled at having their checks and correspondence mailed directly to the billing service. Further compounding this dilemma is," what will happen to the checks and correspondence after the billing service agreement is terminated?"(Again, we will discuss alternatives to this at the end of the article)

Technology

D. State-of-the-art practice management software is an extremely expensive investment. If you've already invested in a high quality computer system I do not believe outsourcing your billing would make much sense financially unless your computer vendor is charging outrageous support fees. If you're considering purchasing a computer system or a medical record management system my favorite vendor who we've been working with for over 15 years is Office Management Solutions (OMS) based in Tampa Florida. The owner's name is John Peake and he is by far the most honest and reputable computer vendor I have ever worked with. OMS can be reached at 813-963-5582 or http://www.oms-online.com.

If you need to update your system, purchase a new system or your support fees are getting out of hand this may be an opportune time to consider outsourcing your medical billing services.

Financial security

F. Many physicians, for obvious reasons do not want their office managers/staffers to have any in-depth knowledge of how much money the practice is making. A reputable and properly run billing service can create this level of financial security. The best case scenario is for your staffers to only see your expenses and have only a limited understanding of the revenue being generated. This can also be accomplished internally by making and recording your own deposits. If you're going to do your own billing I must emphasize the importance of financial security. You must create a system of financial security. If you don't have the time to personally open your mail and make the deposits you are definitely a candidate for outsourcing. Many banks offer a "lockbox" where you can direct your checks and correspondence. Bank lockbox services are generally quite pricey. They usually charge about .25 per copy. You may also opt to take out your own P.O. Box located adjacent to your billing company. This way you still maintain control of your checks and correspondence.

Collection agencies

G. Many billing services own or have affiliate relationships with collection agencies. You'll most definitely want to avoid this situation. Make sure your billing service provides you with a monthly report containing proper information on delinquent accounts enabling your office manager to properly send the information to a collection agency of your choice. In my opinion billing services that own collection agencies or establish close affiliate relationships with them are unethical and should be avoided at all cost. Even though it is nearly impossible to find a collection agency that does not have relationships with medical billing services the point I'm trying to make is to be sure that your billing service is independent and you have the freedom to select a collection agency of your choice. This relationship presents a scenario whereby the billing service can simply go after the easy to collect accounts and allow the more difficult but still collectible ones to slip into the hands of a collection agency who obviously charge a much higher percentage of collections. Again, it's easy to see how a billing service can facilitate or erode your sense of control. The most reputable collection agency I've dealt with is a company called Collection Information Bureau (CIB). I've been doing business with them for years and they have never attempted to establish an affiliate relationship with my company. CIB can be reached at 1-800-231-3514, contact sandy Lopez.

Different types of billing services

There are three different types of billing services.

* Fee per claim

* 50/50

* Full service

Fee per claim billing services charge a flat rate per claim. The fees generally range between $1.25 to $5.00 per claim depending upon the services provided.

Advantages:

· May be helpful to a brand-new practice who is not fully implemented a computer system or is still trying to decide whether to outsource.

· Practices with old or outdated computer systems

· Relatively inexpensive cost per claim

· Excellent for practices who have a problem with only one particular payer group such as Medicare or payers that require electronic claims submission

· Physicians planning to retire within one year

· Highly flexible

· Low-volume practices

· less employees

Disadvantages:

* Expensive for high-volume practices

* Poor integrity of accounts receivable

* Lack of information systems

* Lack of control

50/50

50/50 billing services install computer terminal/terminals in your office. The billing service performs part of the billing process while your office performs the other. As you can probably tell from my list of disadvantages this is in my opinion the least desirable type of billing service.

Advantages:

· Less expensive than full-service billing services

· Avoid the purchase of practice management software

· Creates a system of checks and balances

· less employees

Disadvantages:

* High set up fees

* Low accountability from the billing service

* Lack of control

* Communication Problems(all collection problems will be blamed upon your office)

* Your staff will still probably wind up doing most of the work

* Completely reliant upon the Internet

* Loss of data

* HIPPA issues

Full-service

Advantages:

· completely remove the billing process from your office

· symbiotic relationship

· avoid expensive computer system

· system of checks and balances

· less employees

Disadvantages:

· expensive

· loss of control

· patient relations

· collection agency relationships

Should I outsource my billing checklist: If you answer yes to most of the following questions then you should probably consider outsourcing?

· Is your overall collection rate declining?

· Is your accounts receivable too high?

· Are you experiencing an increased number of denied claims?

· Is your overall frustration level regarding your billing/business office very high?

· Are you facing a major capital investment in new hardware or software?

· Are your computer support fees to high?

· Are you having a difficult time keeping or hiring experienced billing staff?

· Are you spending too much time on the business aspect of medicine?

· Are you concerned that your staff or office manager has knowledge of your income?

· Are you completely reliant upon your office manager?

· Are you planning to expand your practice?

· Do you believe that your practices cost structure is too high?

· Do you have several employees performing tasks that could be handled by a single more experienced manager?

· Is your computer system obsolete?

· Are hardware, software, and information technology disrupting the operation of your practice?

How do I select a billing service?

1. The service should fit or complement the size of your actual practice. Try to get a basic idea of the size of the firm. A solo practice will most likely have greater success with a small to medium-sized billing firm. Obviously, a solo family practitioner would probably not be very well served by a publicly traded firm.

2. Avoid long-term binding contracts. You should be free to terminate your agreement any time within 30 days written notice. The agreement should clearly specify what each side will do for the other. Make sure the agreement assures that upon termination you'll receive a highly detailed account receivable report [listed by individual patient] .

3. Ask for references and call the other providers!

4. Inquire/investigate the actual owner of the company. Ask to speak with the owner directly.

5. Avoid firms who offer too many different types of service. Medical billing is a very highly specialized field. Companies who offer, collection agency services, payroll, financial consulting, tax consulting, malpractice insurance, marketing services etc. etc. are not in my view focused enough on what they're there to do. Collect your money!

6. Ask other physicians. Keep open mind about this one because physicians who are happy with their billing company do not necessarily want them to grow and generally like to keep a low profile on this issue.

7. Is the billing service for sale? Try to ascertain whether or not the firm has recently been sold. In your contract/agreement you should request to be notified within 30 days of the pending sale. In my experience billing services are constantly being bought and sold. Sometimes the acquisition is a positive thing but quite often the merger/acquisition can be very detrimental. You should at least be notified and given ample time to make a proper decision on whether you'll stay with the new firm or select another.

8. Where will your checks and correspondence be mailed? This delicate and important issue need not be as complicated as it appears. Many physicians for obvious reasons are reluctant to allow checks and correspondence to be forwarded directly to their billing service. Some reputable, high-quality billing services will not even provide services to clients who insist upon having the checks and correspondence mailed to them directly. I'd like to spend a few moments on this important issue and explain the ramifications of exactly where your checks and correspondence will be mailed. Maintaining the integrity of your accounts receivable is crucial! If your office routinely fails to properly mail copies of checks and correspondence to your billing company your practice could be in grave danger of losing control of the accounts receivable. If your account receivable is to maintain any semblance of financial integrity it is crucial that billing service employees do not spend valuable time and effort following up on claims that have already paid and not properly forwarded to them. Understandably, your service may even look upon this as an intentional effort to reduce their commissions. Again, bank lock boxes provide a sound alternative to this dilemma. Some practices solve this problem by directing all checks and correspondence to a P.O. Box keeping EOB's separate from other corporate mail. The checks and correspondence are mailed to the billing service," unopened" biweekly. This is an excellent compromise and creates a system of control. There are many other possible options but the important point to remember is that ONE entity must be completely responsible for the validity and integrity of your EOB's.

9. Make sure all checks and correspondence are issued under your tax identification number and made payable to you! Make sure your contract/agreement specifies that the billing service will not countersign or attempt to countersign your checks and correspondence.

David J. Duncan
President and CEO
www.usemedibill.com

Mr. Duncan is a graduate of Florida Atlantic University with a B.A in Finance and is the original founder of Medi-Bill Inc. He also has an extensive law enforcement background and is a former police officer with the City of Fort Lauderdale. Mr. Duncan's reputation for honesty and integrity is well known throughout the medical community. During his career, Mr. Duncan has provided billing, financial and practice management services to physicians and medical practices in a variety of specialties throughout the country. He has extensive experience with, managed-care, hospital contract negotiations, data integration and practice management.

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me at david@usemedibill.com

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Telecom Management - Give Your Telecom Team the Tools They Need

Telecom management in mid-sized companies is not always a full time job. Stretched for resources, the IT team can usually only devote part of the telecom manager's team to managing the telco environment. Reviewing the telecom carrier bills for accuracy and errors typically get pushed further and further down the priority list.

Most of the time, companies will resort to just a face page comparison of the total bill. This approach, while expedient, can lead to costly errors.

Over time, the contents of the bill change. The change is typically slow, so noticeable differences do not appear immediately. New locations may open, or close. Rates may change or discounts expire. Your spending may increase and warrant a larger discount. Who is watching for these changes?

The carrier certainly is not. The telecom carrier leaves the accuracy of the bill up to the customer. You typically have just a few months to dispute a charge, or it is deemed accepted. Small errors can grow over time and become compounded with other errors.

In fact, Gartner reports that an average enterprise customer pays 8-15% too much due to carrier billing mistakes. If your telecom management team is stretched too thin to properly review telecom bills and expenses, you may want to consider a telecom expense management (TEM) platform. A TEM solution does not have to be expensive (in fact there are free versions available) and usually generate a healthy savings opportunity. These savings come in both hard dollars (reduction in telecom costs) and soft dollars (improved productivity of the telecom team).

Without a telecom management system, your costs will likely grow. Explaining how you saved money to the CFO will be much easier than explaining why costs increased in these times when everyone is trying to cut back.

A good TEM program will cover both your wireline and wireless services and provide for monthly bill aggregation and testing, financial reports that allocate costs to appropriate cost centers and assign general ledger codes, and provide a platform to track and evaluate network inventory. Managed services are frequently available, but not necessary. The free versions of TEM software are, of course, self-service.

If you are looking to gain control over your wireline and wireless telecommunictions environment or looking for a free TEM application, go to http://www.my-tem.com. my-tem.com provides simple free telecommunications expense management solutions.

my-tem offers a leading mid-market telecom expense mangement (TEM) solution for free to business clients. my-tem supports all wireline and wireless/cellular services. Get organized and start finding areas to reduce your telecommunications expense quickly and easily with my-tem.com's free TEM offer.

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Online Invoicing - Paperless and Manageable

Most business offices find billing and invoicing processes a little tricky. Most of the time, you will be dealing with different clients who want to pay and you must determine how much. Then after you are done with it, you create a printed invoice and mail or deliver it to the client. You have to track when billings are already sent, which have been paid, and do follow-ups with those who are in need of a reminder for he/she might forget it. If you are still using paper invoicing, that can be quite messy and when problems occur, you are obliged to look and browse over all paper records to verify the issue. It's already a waste of time and sometimes with this, works are delayed and costumer service is a failure. This scenario affects business, whether small or big. That's why through online invoicing, businesses and companies can automate and organize the procedures, making the entire invoicing process less time-consuming and less costly while giving more insight into the company's money flow.

Using an online billing, clients are able to receive and update their invoices using their e-mail with links. Once they receive the e-mail invoice, they can freely view and read it and if they are willing to pay the bill, they can also do it. If they desire to upload the PDF version of the bill, they still can. Backups are installed automatically and payments are already catered via online systems like for instance the PayPal and the Authorize.net.

This billing system is not only applicable for all; it is also made your office clean and green because you are not dependent to the use of papers anymore. That's why offices who are in need of de-cluttering due to pile of papers and other related documents, electronic invoicing can be a great help. Not only you make the working environment green, you are also saving a lot because you minimize the use of ink to print papers and postage stamps in sending it. If some clients opt for paper invoice, these online bills can be printed also, punched with a return receipt and put in a window envelope together with the returned mailing envelop for the client.

Online billing application can manage both: invoices and expenses. So with this, your bookkeeping essentially manages itself. Range from sending and managing bills, to tracking time and spending, to making estimates, online form of billing means there's no need to purchase cabinets or drawers for folders and books storage.

Learn more about e-bill Also find out more about e-bill today.

The McDonaldisation of Management

It is 7am at the front desk of an exclusive hotel in the US. She is tall, wearing a name badge, immaculately dressed, extremely polite, and, fundamentally, very unlucky to have me in front of her. I am an angry customer checking out after a three-day stay when everything that could go wrong went wrong. The shower went from volcanic to polar temperatures with no warning, room service took an average of 70 minutes, the housekeeper thought that the room was empty and stormed in during my post-jetlag early bedtime, the TV screen told me I would be charged for movies that I had not watched, one of the telephones in the room did not work, and next door neighbours had a 24-hour party which the thin walls broadcast to the world. And the price of the room was astronomical.

I looked in her eyes and described the litany of problems, frustrations and near-suicidal feelings. I was furious. I looked and sounded furious. She took some notes on a little yellow pad while nodding at my list of problems. She even looked sympathetic for a fraction of second. "Obviously, sir, I will let the manager know." OK, great! Then she hands me the bill.

"Did you have a good stay, sir?"

I couldn't believe it at first, but it was something in her automatic pilot look that gave me the clue. The handing out of the bill must come, I thought, in their automatic pilot Customer Happiness, Care and Services Training sort of way together with a "did you have a good day, sir". The fact that the customer has just given an apocalyptic account of the hotel does not figure in the manual.

"No, I didn't have a good stay, as a matter of fact, I have just explained to you for the last ten minutes that I've been on the verge of a nervous breakdown and those sort of states usually are mutually exclusive with a good stay." "I am sorry to hear that, sir. Next time we will make sure that things are better." "There isn't a next time, my friend." "Excuse me?"

"Oh, forget it."

Then she looks puzzled. I have the bill in my hands and haven't put it away or gone yet. I am in the process of exhibiting the strangest of behaviours, apparently, that is, reading it.

"OK, all set," she sort of insists. "No, it's not all set," I pronounce with a heavy accent on the 'all'. "May I read it and see if I agree?" "Yes, sure, but it's all on your American Express already." "Tell me, is it common practice here to ignore the content of bills?" "No sir, of course sir, you are welcome to do it... but usually people here come on business."

I'll spare you my comments on the incredible inference that people in business are not expected to care about bills; they are all expenses after all and usually somebody else's money.

That lady at the front desk had a very precise mental (and physical) algorithm on what to do and what to say. It was all in the training manual, I suppose, and in some sort of Standard Operating Procedure where deviations are not allowed, judgement not needed. A robot from Silicon Valley could have done a similar or even better job.

Management can be very similar to front desks at 7am in exclusive business hotels. In some organisations things must happen in a standard way and deviations are a sin. Many managers are trapped in semi-religious attitudes towards 'the process'.

A 'process' is a pathway that usually takes you to places. The more people follow that particular path, the higher the probability of reaching that particular destination. When the process is king, no spontaneous efforts are needed to reach the destination - this is why we have a process, we say. But the process runs the risk of creating an automatic pilot culture where people don't question things any more and where work has been 'McDonaldised'.

McDonaldisation of work has been described as a way of ensuring consistency and continuity well outside the fast food industry. How many times do we use the word 'consistency' in our daily management? Probably as many as we use the word 'objective'. When was the last time you wanted to hire a manager who was inconsistent and subjective (yes, like your teenager daughter)?

Many management practices in organisations are there as a given, unquestioned, as part of a supposed 'body of good practice'. The problem with semi-obsessive process-driven organisation is that progressively it generates less and less need for judgement. Total McDonaldisation equals end of judgement. It works for McDonalds.

If in doubt, next time you take your kids there try to ask for a 'medium rare' for you and a 'rare' for them, two kinds of fries, overcooked and normal, double-size bread for you and to swap the inclusive soft drink for another liquid. They'll call the men in white coats.

Judgement is in short supply. It requires exercise of the cortex in the brain. McDonaldised management is mainly under paleoencephalic, subcortical control. Management spends an enormous amount of time creating, designing, redesigning and changing processes. It's all a matter of having lots of well-defined pipes connected to each other to push things through. Managers who believe that management is basically a plumbing system will make sure that the right things (ideas, money, time, products, molecules, memos, checklists and teleconferences) enter the system through the right input pipe. Then they'll go home and back several times until at some point things start to appear at the end. Helas, here it comes: the project team minutes, the new hires, the amended SOP or the decision to proceed

(to the next set of pipes).

Henry Ford epitomised the McDonaldised manager when he wondered, "why is it that each time I ask for a pair of hands, they come attached to a brain?" He also produced the famous "you can have any colour of car you want as long as it's black".

It would be easy to see the caricature in all this, the surface, the tip of the iceberg in these lines, and pretend that I am praising a lack of processes. Far from it. We need processes, and, dare I say, strong and solid ones. But they have to come with an equal dose of judgement, sometimes based on values and beliefs, that may force you to bypass the process. We are rich in pipes and poor in new ideas to flow through them. We can create enormous, fabulous, pristine and elegant plumbing systems that may push rubbish through. Add to that process a 'time to market programme' and you will deliver rubbish faster. Not bad. And sad.

Management needs to be aware of the potential danger of McDonaldisation of work itself and management practices in general. There are no esoteric tricks here to fix it. Ask yourself as many times as you can the most important management question: "what is the question we are trying to answer" and its equivalent: "why are we doing this?" "is this the only way?" "what are the alternatives?" Kids go through a period of personal development when they ask 'why' every other second. Management could do with some regression to childhood.

Supermarket checkout at 4.30pm. I have reached the checkout with the same pride as a climber planting the flag on the summit. I carry about 100 items in a basket designed to hold half a dozen little packets. I look overwhelmed, exhausted and am praying for a magic trick that will automatically allocate my groceries and the rest to the right plastic bags. I have bought more things that I can carry. "Will that be all, sir?"

I thought of the girl at the front desk in the US hotel. Somewhere in her subcortical system, the word 'bill' (or was it the noise of the printer) triggered the 'did-you-have-a-nice-stay' thing.

"No, it's not all, I just happen to be in the checkout proximity and thought, hey, let's unload the stuff in bits and pieces; I am going to leave all this here with you, I promise I'll be back. Tell the other 20 in the queue to wait."

I did not say that of course. I behaved myself. I am getting increasingly intolerant of automatic behaviours. The supermarket assistant would ask the same question of everybody regardless of the number of items, size of the basket, or any other variable. There is something somewhere in the SOP part of the brain that makes people in supermarket checkouts ask that question. Invariably, 100 out of 100 customers say, "yes, that's all" (at least in my random sample experimental conditions).

Next week, same time, same place, same assistant. Before he could say a word, I said "That's all today". He looked at me. "Funny you should say that! I was going to ask you."

My natural inquisitive nature, or my frustrated anthropologist within, led me to ask the question: "Why do you all say this all the time?" "You'd be surprised, sir, some customers ask for a pack of cigarettes once we've finished the transaction, that's why we ask if they're sure that it will be all, you see?" "But, you don't sell cigarettes here at this checkout!" "You have a point, sir, you have a point."

Dr Leandro Herrero practiced as a psychiatrist for more than fifteen years before taking up senior management positions in several pharmaceutical companies, both in the UK and the US. He is co-founder and CEO of The Chalfont Project Ltd, an international firm of organizational consultants. Taking advantage of his behavioral sciences background - coupled with his hands-on business experience - he works with organizations of many kinds on structural and behavioral change, leadership and human collaboration. He has published several books, among which The Leader with Seven Faces, Viral Change and New Leaders Wanted: Now Hiring!, all published by meetingminds.

All articles posted on E-zine by Leandro Herrero are copyright ? Leandro Herrero.

http://www.meetingminds.com - http://www.thechalfontproject.com

Successful Property Managers

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Correctly Selecting the Perfect Property Management System

Managers and owners need to pay careful attention to selecting the right property management system. Reliability, proven capability, data protection, integrated management, integrated billing, integrated credit and background check, and integrated services are critical. As a manager, we need to know that we aren't trying out new technology and that our system is designed to maximize revenue and minimize cost. Finally, a great management system should facilitate great customer service.

How does a manager prove to that they have the right system?

First, there are a few questions you should be asking. These include:

How long has your system been in use with property managers?
How many managers use the system?
How many properties and units are under management?
What is the cost per unit and how does that cost scale for 10 units, 20 units, 100 units and so on?
What financial statements will the system produce?
Will the system integrate with quickbooks or the system you use?
What other services and modules come with the system?
Can you process credit cards, ach payments, auto debit payments, electronic checks, etc?
Is there integration for criminal and credit background checking?
Is there integration and automation for online advertising?
What features are offered for property structure and type, additional fees, one time charges, recurring chargest, payment due date notification, overdue payment notification and so on.
What features are provided for maintenance management? How does the system manage work orders? How is work order scheduling handled?
What about vendor management?
Are you able to scan and attach records for units, for buildings, for residents, for vendors, etc.
How are capital improvements tracked and recorded?
What about owner records and management of capital accounts?
Will the system produce 1099s and other tax support documents?
Can you charge by the tenant rather than by the unit?
Are you able to support process related tracking of effort?
Can you upload photos, logos, and other information.
What documents, letters, statements, invoices, bills, etc. can the system produce? What management of these exists.
Is there offsite backup integrated? What is the disaster recovery capability? What file and record recovery exists? Is the system web based, pc based, server based, etc.
What training is offered? What is free? What is offered via classes? Is there private training available? What documentation exists?
Do you pay extra for upgrades?

Of course there are many other items, but this list will get you off to a good start choosing and integrating your management system.

Blake Ratcliff (US Naval Academy Graduate & Marine Officer, Serial startup entrepreneur, COO/CEO, multifamily / residential investment founder, and property manager).

Blake's crafted 100+ business plans, prepared and delivered 1000+ investor presentations, and is an expert financial modeler. A deeply experienced real estate business person and startup business expert, Blake hones your Business plans, reports, and presentations.

Visit http://internationalresidentialrealestateinvestorsassociation.org/real-estate-project-services-due-diligence-reports-business-plans

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Telecom Billing Errors Are Bleeding Your Bottom Line

It's hard to imagine services more vital to your business operation than telephones and data circuits. Yet the Gartner Group research firm identifies telecom as among the most poorly managed functions in many organizations. "It is not hyperbole to state that networks and telecom are the worst managed functions in I.T.," Eric Goodness, Gartner's vice president for managed and professional services, told CIO Magazine.

Complicating already-complex telecom services are the mergers, bankruptcies, layoffs and general upheaval in the telecom world. It simply couldn't come at a worse time for businesses working to control cost or adopt new commuication technologies.

TELECOM SURVIVAL TIPS

A surprising number of telecom services are billed incorrectly, so it pays to understand exactly what the phone companies are charging you for. Some don't make it easy. Phone bills filled with strange telecom lingo, taxes, surcharges, and arcane service descriptions. On the other hand, even the largest providers send bills that contain so little detail it is impossible to tell exactly what you are paying for. That's why there can be a big payoff in conducting some dial tone detective work.

- Ask the phone company for "customer service records" for each account. This document will list every phone number you are being billed for, and all the various features and surcharges associated with it. Check it carefully for numbers you don't recognize. Many businesses find they are still paying for modem lines, alarm lines, or other services they no longer use.

- Look for potentially unnecessary services such as voice mail, call forwarding, inside wire maintenance, etc. These services can add $25 per month to the cost of a single phone line.

- Check your bills every month for charges from USBI, ILD Teleservices, HT Teleservices, OAN Services or ZPDI. These, and many other third parties, may be billing you inflated long-distance rates, sometimes as high as $3.75 cents per minute, or other fees for services you do not need.

Even your trusted local phone company may be billing you ridiculous rates for something called "local toll" calls. These calls are typically to cities outside your free calling area, but still within the state. Charges of 36 cents per minute or more are not uncommon, even though you could be paying 90 percent less if your phone lines were included in a master long distance agreement.

REAL-WORLD EXAMPLES OF BILLING GONE BAD

- A regional Indiana bank was shocked to learn that it was still paying hundreds of dollars a month for a T1 data circuit to a branch location. Why? The branch was closed and the building torn down two years previously. The phone company refused to give credits because the bank could not document a request to disconnect the circuit.

- Detailed analysis for a growing, acquisition-oriented business with 50+ locations found more than $1,500 per month in private alarm circuits to various police departments that were no longer being used.

- Although a mid-sized business had negotiated a fair rate for long distance calls that cross state lines, the contract did not address calls within its state - 85 percent of its volume. Changing that one oversight will result in savings of $125,000 this year.

- A Texas business learned it was wasting thousands per year by having data circuits under individual contracts, rather than negotiating a master agreement that reduced rates across the board.

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY OF TELECOM CONTRACTS

Signing contracts with your telecom providers can definitely lead to lower rates. Unfortunately, inexperienced negotiators often focus on price alone and do not research contract terms and language that can limit your choices and prove expensive in the long run.

Keep these factors in mind when considering any agreement for voice or data services:

- In today's fluid telecom marketplace, it seldom makes sense to sign agreements longer than 24 months.

- Watch out for minimum annual revenue commitments or discount schemes that lock you into specific spending levels - and penalize you for falling short.

- Make sure long distance agreements include competitive rates for interstate and intrastate, or discounts that cover both types of calls.

- Scrutinize all offers that require an exclusivity clause in exchange for low rates or high discounts.

- Insist on language that lets you upgrade to new technology, such as voice over Internet protocol, with no penalties.

BEING PROACTIVE PAYS

Multi-location businesses often find themselves challenged by the administrative burden of managing large stacks of phone bills. Turnover among the accounts payable staff frequently results in inexperienced or untrained employees being saddled with the unpleasant task of reviewing telecom invoices, and then arguing with phone companies to correct errors. With so much money at stake a growing number of corporations are outsourcing management of telecom services.  Some outsourcers charge a percentage of savings they generate, typically between 30-50%. Others work on an hourly rate, negotiate fixed retainers, or a blend of both.

If you choose to keep telecom management in-house, take a hard look at your processes. Make sure every invoice gets a thorough review by someone familiar with your telecom landscape and knows how to challenge billing errors and unauthorized charges. Also, insist that all telecom services be ordered through a structured process, and is recorded in a master database. All changes must be communicated to accounts payable. Maintaining an accurate inventory is important step to keep from paying for services you no longer use.

Businesses are learning the hard way that ongoing internal communication and proactive management are required to make managing telecom expense less painful than that red-hot needle!

Lee Kelso is co-founder of The BBK Group, a telecom management company. BBK Group manages telecom services for banks, medical practices, and corporations in 20+ states. http://www.bbkgroup.net, 866-225-4625.

The Medical Billing Specialist

Medical billing specialist plays an important behind-the-scene role in the health care system. Medical specialist is someone who does billing work for a health care facility. They help to speed up the process of payment. This type of billing is considered to be one of the fastest growing careers in the medical sector. As medical offices and other health care sectors need more efficient and quality ways to collect their payments, the need for medical specialist continues to grow. Billing specialists work for insurance companies, doctors, hospitals, pharmacies and other health related facilities generating invoices and managing billing. They communicate between medical offices, patients and insurance companies. But they are also expected to do patient scheduling, payroll, receiving and making phone calls and insurance verification. Some organizations allow billers to work even from home.

Most companies and practices look for experienced or trained billing specialists. As a trained biller they are able to analyze and perform the billing and claiming more efficiently. Any error in the billing and claiming can be very serious and may lead to legal complications. From past few years, online training courses are very popular and medical billing course is no exception. It allows the students to complete their entire course being at home. So, it is very convenient to people who have a busy life. In order to prepare a skilled medical specialist, these courses train their students in anatomy; physiology; insurance claim procedure and techniques; medical terminologies and abbreviations. These courses cost a few thousands, but some of the courses are flexible in payment, so that who cannot do a down payment can still afford to learn billing course. These trainings usually range from one year to two years. Anything less is not so recommended as hospitals and other organizations don't prefer them.

Medical specialists earn a respectable salary. But wage mainly depends on the years of experience in this field. Medical billers usually work in an office setting, Even though they work for health care facilities, they don't work where the patients are being seen. They usually work 8 hours a day, but sometimes this job demands overtime work. Medical billing specialists have been able to work from home as independent consultants. They either work for independent physicians or larger organizations that provide their work via electronic means.

New jobs are constantly created including medical billing. But studies have shown that 18% of medical billing posts have not filled due to lack of qualified candidates. So, skilled and committed medical billing specialists can expect a bright future in medical billing.

Having a medical transcriptionist from home job is a great way to stay close to your family. All you really need to do is get a medical billing and coding certification and then start looking for jobs available in your area.

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Project Billing Software

Project management is an important aspect of service oriented firms. Project management includes several components like planning, execution, tracking time as well as billing to the client and this can at times create complications leading to in accuracy in accounting. Integrating various project management variables for creating the perfect outcome is difficult manually and this is where project management, time and billing software comes into play. There are plenty of players in the market who offer project management and billing software's but one of the high quality and top end software is the project billing software promoted and managed by TimeSolv. This project billing software offers expense tracking and billing with hourly and project fee billing options. One of the most important aspects is that it is accessible 24x7 over the internet.

What are the other benefits you can derive from this project billing software? There are many but let us look at some of the important ones:

Tracking and Billing at any location

Some of the big firms have service and project teams situated across geographical boundaries with offices around the world. For the same purpose, you will require and internet hosted project billing and management software so that it enhanced the billing to clients in foreign locations across the world. The salient point of this project billing software is that it can be used offline as well as online. So if a professional of your firm updates the billing or tracking information of a particular project over the internet sitting in Budapest then you will be able to check it sitting in Los Angeles or Beijing.

The project billing software also offers flexible invoicing options. If you are billing a foreign client then the software will recalculate un-billed entries on the basis of the conversion rate changes like Dollar to Pounds or Dollar to Lira etc.

Keeping a tab on budgets

One of the salient features of the project billing software is that it keeps a tab on multiple current tasks, budgets for each of the tasks, and also the project status and all this is accomplished using a single interface. Single interface means that there will be no confusion or complication. You will also be able to easily assess any resource requirement for a particular project the moment you are logged into the hosting server. You can benefit from the instant notifications, which can assist various project managers to evaluate the overall performance and progress of their service team or a particular member. Your team members and managers can even offer suggestions, share information, and update project requirements and tasks using the interface.

Billing accuracy

This is the single most important benefit of the project billing software. You can set the billing arrangement at the start of a project depending on your client's needs. The actual billing and time tracking as well as reporting will be managed by the billing software's automatic recognition capability. As a result, you will be able to drastically reduce any client disputes. The accurate billing capability will reduce the requirement of adjustment in hourly rates or even in fixed fee agreements.

For further information, please visit Project Billing Software

Importance Of Medical Billing

Nowadays medical professionals are finding it difficult to manage day-to-day affairs, particularly administrative issues. Medical billing is one such area in which healthcare professionals are facing a daunting task of trying to cope up with the rapidly changing coding or billing rules and requirements. These days a lot of paperwork is involved that not only causes hindrance, but sometimes also become a cause for inordinate delays in payment and billing purposes.

Need For An Billing Software

There is an urgent need to have a good way of managing the electronic medical records. This task can only be made easy with the help of good practice management software. So, what do you actually seek from billing software? Well, the answer is simple. You would expect the software to make sure that the billing calculations are done accurately and efficiently. Besides, you will also want the software to be available to you on the Internet so that you can access it from anywhere in the world.

Practice management software (PMS) is a kind of software that caters to the daily operations of a medical practice. You can get this PMS software in the following ways. The first way is to contact a software company and ask it to make this software for your organization. The other option for you is to hire a group of software professionals to get the software made for you. Finally, you can also buy off-the-shelf software and get it customized according to your needs and requirements.

Most software companies would charge you good amount of money in order to get the software up and running. If you have very low budget, you can hire a group of software professionals and get the software made for you. Finding such a group to prepare the medical billing software is quite easy, and you will not have many problems getting the work done from them.

Are your collections too low and receivables very high? If yes, then you definitely need to check out http://www.practiceanswers.com and get the right solution for the medical billing software.

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Outsourced Medical Billing Software and Service Selection in 14 Steps

Over four thousand vendors of medical billing services offer solutions to medical practices nationwide in response to poor in-house billing performance and increasing regulatory scrutiny of billing processes. On one hand, such a large number of outsourced billing solutions ensure continued competitiveness in terms of both service quality and pricing. On the other hand, the lack of uniform service standards and metrics among the vendors, combined with their large numbers, makes the process of vendor selection difficult and error-prone. While the availability of a large vendor selection allows finding an alternative to unsatisfactory service, billing vendor-switching costs remain high, motivating extra effort and focus during the stage of vendor selection. This article outlines basic fourteen-step guidelines for an effective and efficient medical billing vendor selection process.

1. Scope of Services

Decide if you are looking for billing technology, billing service, or practice workflow solution. If you plan to manage billing in-house, you may only need a billing technology solution. In that case your next decision is whether you wish to own the technology or to rent access to it.

Complete practice workflow solution belongs to the other end of the spectrum of services and starts with appointment scheduling and includes electronic medical records, SOAP notes, and billing. Few vendors today offer such integrated packages as they require powerful vericle-like technologies used by trained and skilled personnel implementing rigorous and disciplined service processes.

A billing-only service belongs to the middle ground between the choices described above and may include coding, electronic claim submission, "scrubbing" (validation), payment posting, claim and payment reconciliation, followup, secondary submission, and patient billing.

2. Billing Model

Billing model selection is the second most important decision in your definition of desired vendor. What is the policy of followup process prioritization? Who decides on which claims to followup? Which of the following functions are automated: upfront claim validation, submission, reconciliation, and follow-up workload allocation?

3. Reporting and Transparency

Transparency is a critical aspect of outsourcing billing service because without transparency the service may not be reliable. To be able to observe every step of the billing process on a continuous 24 x 7 basis, reporting must be available using a secure HIPAA compliant connection over the Internet.

The ability to provide timely and useful reports depends on billing model (see above) and billing technology. Vendors that manage their own billing technology typically have better control of reporting capabilities in terms of scope, analysis, frequency, and transparency. At the minimum, the following features must be available:

Operational Report shows total claims and $ amounts submitted, paid, adjusted, written off, and failed. It allows breakdown by cpt, payer, referral, or a combination of such dimensions.

Denials Report shows the list of denied claims and a log of followup actions. By sorting it by amount paid, you can tell the smallest payment the billing service will fight for.

Compliance Report shows the potential for post-payment audit and itemizes compliance violations.

Reporting Frequency defines the data update intervals on existing reports and turnaround time for new reports.

Data Aggregation and Analysis must allow arbitrary data aggregation and drill-in. Export to Excel spreadsheets for further analysis is a very useful feature.


4. Certification

Request formal certification of compliance with basic regulatory requirements. Stay away from national vendors with New Jersey clients or New Jersey vendors without formal certification from New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance.

5. References

Ask for a list of references owning similar practices. Are the clients satisfied with results, support, and changes over time? Can they quantify billing service quality in terms of Accounts Receivable over 120 days and underpayment reduction?

6. Billing Service Quality

Make a list of metrics used by the service. Focus on collections completeness and payment delay. Can the vendor quantify the differences between payers and between various CPT codes in real time? Does the vendor follow up every denial? What is the denial followup success rate?

7. Compliance

Consider two aspects of compliance, namely, your practice and billing service. Request to review a written compliance program for the billing service. Ask for its update procedure. For your practice, request an interface to a legal service specializing in post-payment audit risk management.

8. Communications Protocols

A disciplined vendor has a formal and simple process to report problems and track their resolution. Your practice must have a competent account manager and regular meetings scheduled to review outstanding problems.

9. Data Security and Protection

Review data center facilities. Ask for evidence on HIPAA compliance: claims must be viewed only on the "need to know" basis, access to claims and modifications must be thoroughly documented. Data must be protected with redundant disaster recovery measures. Review backup process, backup intervals, and data restore capabilities.

10. Data Entry Protocols

Modern technologies allow the doctor to take over coding and reduce the billing role down to claims processing and followup. Technology-competent vendor will supply your superbill online, along with a separate form for patient and charge entry, EOB posting, and on-line claim editing. Similarly, much of data entry validity, including some of claim scrubbing will be done online at the point of data entry.

11. Processes for Continuous Improvement

A successful vendor must have developed an effective process to identify and resolve systemic errors. Without such a process, the vendor will lose competitiveness and you will have to switch the services at a later stage.

12. Size and Scalability

Automation defines scalability. The more steps are automated, the easier it is for the vendor to take on new clients without impairing service quality. To understand vendor's scalability, you must compare gross annual billings, claim volumes, and numbers of doctors. Avoid vendors that would have to treble their scale because of serving your practice.

13. Staffing

Review staff numbers, educational background, experience, and reporting structure. Understand the process of quality assurance and accountability. Avoid vendors that would have to double their staff to serve your account.

14. Pricing

Most billing service vendors charge a percentage of monthly collections. This percentage varies across specialties, depending on the average claim billing size and claim volume. Note that the lowest cost provider is not necessarily the best. Read our companion article on relative value of billing quality and price-performance relationship.

Yuval Lirov, PhD, author of Practicing Profitability - Network Effect for Revenue Cycle Control in Healthcare Clinic and Chiropractic Office: Scheduling, SOAP Notes, Care Plans, Coding, Billing, Collections, and Audit Risk (Affinity Billing) and Mission Critical Systems Management (Prentice Hall), inventor of patents in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Security, and CEO of Vericle.net - Distributed Billing and Practice Management Technologies. Yuval invites you to register to the next webinar on audit risk at BillingPrecision.com

Taking Control of Your Telecom Bills - TEM Best Practices

Let's face it. Most of the telecom bills we receive every month are mountains of cryptic information that is not easily deciphered. In most cases, we do not have the time, expertise, or the resources to be able to accurately assess and granularly audit this billing information against our telecom services inventory, contractual terms and obligations set forth in our relationship with our many telecom service providers.

What are the consequences of this oversight? Consider these findings from a study by Aberdeen Group**, a leading TEM research company, on telecom expense management practices within large and medium sized organistions:

- 7% to 12% of telecom service charges are in error

- 85% of a typical enterprise's telecom bills are not audited internally and simply paid in full

- For bills that are validated, billing analysts most often examine only a subset of invoices associated with the largest spending.

It's clear that without any sort of formal process to manage and process bills within large to medium sized organisations, wastage and overspend will result.

What can be done? One of the first recommendations I typically make during my consulting engagements with clients who are looking to adopt TEM for the first time is to automate and streamline their current bill management practices.

What does this mean? Adopting TEM bill management best practices will look to centralise all bill processing activities for voice, data, and mobile invoices across the organisation. Centralising bill processing will mean the collection and aggregation of all service provider billing invoices with its associated data which will serve as the basis for bill audits, cost allocations, and consolidated reporting of expenditures within the enterprise. Leveraging the right technology or outsourcing partner to perform these tasks is key to a successful TEM bill management deployment.

Redeployment or reduction of staffing resources is another cost saving benefit resulting from the adoption of TEM bill management best practices. Since a large portion of the billing tasks such as bill acquisition and bill auditing are automated, staffing related to these tasks are typically redeployed to other duties within the organisation.

Ultimately, how much can you save by adopting TEM bill management best practices? I have found, based on past experience, that organisations achieve anywhere between 10%-15% in first year savings, 7%-10% in second year savings, and 3%-5% in on-going savings in subsequent years. These are hard savings that are quantifiable, but let's not forget the soft savings as well. By centralising the acquisition and storage of billing data, we eliminate the need to process information in different formats and from different tools and systems. We also streamline the billing process by compressing the time it takes to receive a bill to the point of payment through accounts payable. By shortening the billing process, we save on time and labour. Cost allocations are more granular since we capture all cost details and can associate these costs with the appropriate cost center. Finally, reporting in customisable formats and views can be achieved as a result of the single repository containing all billing data from every telecom service provider.

Adopting TEM bill management best practices is only the first step towards total telecom cost management within the organisation. Since TEM takes a holistic approach to managing telecom costs, other areas of consideration where wastage occurs is in inventory management, contract management, procurement, and improper sourcing strategies. The combined savings from each of these areas will generate significant savings in annual telecom expenditures and best of all, these savings will fall straight to the bottom line.

**Aberdeen Group, "The Total Telecom Cost Management Process Benchmark Report", Feb. 2006

Peter Hum is Principal Consultant at Eastcom Systems. Peter has been a leading pioneer in establishing the early stages of the Telecom Expense Management (TEM) market across Asia/Pacific for the past many years and has contributed his views on TEM in industry publications and at industry conferences. Peter can be reached here

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5 Steps To Managing Your Finances When You Have ADHD

Many people with AD/HD have trouble managing their finances. They usually don't have an effective system for paying bills and acquire an overwhelming amount of debt, due to impulsive spending. Managing finances requires attention to detail, record keeping, timeliness, and organizational skills; all things that are challenging to people with AD/HD.

Here is a simple, yet effective way to manage your money and pay your bills on time:
1. Collect: You need to know what's coming in and what's going out in order to effectively manage your money. Collect one month's worth of pay stubs and bills in one container.
2. Enter: Creating a visual representation of when your money comes in and goes out will give you a clearer picture of your financial situation and make it easier to develop a payment schedule. Print out a blank calendar or use an online calendar such as Yahoo Calendar or Google Calendar. Enter all payment amounts for each bill on its due date. Then enter the amount of your paycheck on the dates you get paid. This is your bill payment calendar for the month.
3. Analyze: Use your bill payment calendar to analyze when you have the money to pay your bills. If you get paid twice a month, then those days should be your bill payment days. Divide your bills into those that will be paid with the first check of the month and those that will be paid with the second check of the month. Schedule a reminder on your paydays to pay your bills and use your calendar to check off payments.
4. Setup: The easiest way to pay bills nowadays is online. Most banks offer free bill payment and even if your bank charges a fee; it may be worth it to avoid late fees. Sign up for online access to your bank if you don't already have it and setup your bill payment service. Even if your bill can't be paid electronically, your bank will mail out a paper check. Once you do the initial setup all you have to do is enter who, how much, and when you want your payment scheduled (just make sure to schedule your payments far enough in advance for the bill to be paid on time).
5. Budget: Now that you know how much money is coming in and what your fixed expenses are, you should start tracking your unfixed expenses. For the next month, try to collect all of the receipts where you paid cash. At the end of the month take your cash receipts and your bank statements and categorize your expenses. Where are you spending too much money? Where can you cut back? Now that you know how much you have, where it's going and what needs to be paid when; you have control over your finances and can determine how much money you can actually afford to spend without breaking the bank.
*For those who find money management too overwhelming, there is help available. Daily Money Managers do everything from paying your bills for you to balancing your checkbook and organizing your records. For more information, check out The American Association of Daily Money Managers.
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Kim Collins is an AD/HD Coach specializing in Career Transition & Workplace Productivity. She is dedicated to providing Personal and Professional Life Management Solutions for individuals struggling with Attention and Organizational difficulties. If you or someone you know is searching for help with their ADHD, career issues, or productivty... Get A Coach! Log on to Organized Kaos for more information. Please don't forget to read my blog at coachkim.blogspot.com.