5 ways to make your healthcare staff more effective at point-of-service collections
Even when a medical practice takes formal steps to promote up-front patient collections, following through with the process is often easier said than done. It’s not surprising why. Healthcare services are expensive especially for those with high deductible health plans. Even a nominal copayment may be unaffordable. To complicate matters, inflation remains at the highest level in more than 40 years, and many people continue to struggle financially with most living paycheck to paycheck. Some say it’s likely that all but the top one percent of consumers will be worse off financially by mid-2024 than they were pre-pandemic.
With these predictions in mind, medical practices must take a proactive approach to patient collections in 2024 and beyond. This includes obtaining accurate insurance and demographic information, streamlining processes to verify insurance eligibility, and empowering front-desk staff to engage in compassionate collections.
Up-front collection challenges remain
Patients’ personal financial dilemmas present countless challenges for today’s medical practices trying to ensure financial sustainability. Unless front-desk staff have the resources and knowledge necessary to ask for up-front payment effectively, financial conversations with patients can become extremely awkward and even confrontational. Without clear guidance, point-of-service collections can actually jeopardize patient satisfaction and retention. In some cases, well-intentioned but ill-prepared front-desk staff may avoid financial conversations altogether or end the conversations prematurely simply to put patients at ease and prevent them from walking out the door.
Why medical practices must prioritize point-of-service collections
However, these challenges shouldn’t deter medical practices from engaging in up-front collections and striving to do better. That’s because point-of-service collections:
Decrease accounts receivable days
Introduce opportunities for face-to-face patient education that can aid revenue cycle management
Mitigate bad debt and write-offs
Reduce the cost to collect
Empowering front-desk staff through compassionate collections
What is the biggest asset in terms of promoting up-front collections? People. Front desk employees are the ones who can make or break the entire patient collections process. Through compassionate collections, they can increase the likelihood patients will pay their medical bill prior to receiving services.
Here are five strategies to help front-desk staff navigate challenging patient financial conversations with ease:
Decide how much to collect. Collecting a standard copayment amount from patients is pretty straightforward. However, for patients with high deductible health plans or self-pay patients, it becomes more complicated. Create an internal fee schedule chart to remove the guesswork. Focus on commonly rendered services. Use historical financial data and detailed revenue cycle management reports to determine how much, on average, insured patients pay out of pocket for these services. Then decide whether you’re going to collect the entire amount of the medical bill or a percentage of it. However, be sure to let patients know this is an approximate amount and that the final amount due might be higher or lower than this estimate. It’s always a good idea to estimate financial obligations on the higher side so patients are pleasantly surprised when they receive a refund.
Provide empathy training. It’s all about changing a patient’s mindset so they are open to paying before services are rendered. To do this, front desk staff must be confident and empathic while simultaneously being able to set the expectation that payment is owed at the point of service. One strategy is to try and build rapport (e.g., ask patients about their pets, children, or other interests) before having the financial conversation. Staff must also possess emotional intelligence and the ability to ask questions to understand the patient’s experience and point of view—and then follow up with appropriate responses (e.g., ‘You’re not alone,’ or ‘I would feel the same way.’).
Develop point of service collection scripts. For example, when asking for payment, staff should leverage open-ended questions such as ‘How would you like to pay’ or ‘Which of our payment options would you prefer?’ These scripts also help front-desk staff know what to do when they’ve exhausted all attempts to collect at the time of service. For example, a script may direct staff to offer an alternative payment solution such as a payment plan or partial up-front payment. Even a small down payment toward anticipated medical debt can increase the likelihood patients will continue to pay when they receive the bill after the visit. And even if a patient doesn’t follow through with payment, collecting something at the time of service is far better than collecting nothing.
Leverage team huddles. Share lessons learned to help staff prepare for difficult scenarios. The more exposure staff have to a variety of patient responses and circumstances, the better.
Provide observation, coaching, and mentoring. Even well-trained, emotionally intelligent new staff members may benefit from observing other staff members converse with patients about medical debt before they interact directly with patients themselves. When new employees do eventually engage in financial conversations with patients, seasoned staff can provide feedback on those interactions to improve the patient experience.
Conclusion
Up-front collections must be a priority for medical practices in 2024 and beyond. However, front-desk staff need the right tools to be successful. These important conversations directly affect the financial health of the business. Learn how edgeMED can help and be sure to check the Healthy Snacks blog for more expert insights, best practices and industry trends.
