Question:
Is there any action a dental office can take to make people pay? Apparently
some dentists have huge outstanding account receivables due to patients who
refuse to pay? Can anything be done? or is this inevitable and part of the
job?
Answer:
This is a problem in any business. Obviously, try to offer your patients
options in payment (Credit card, Debit, cheque, cash) and offer flexible
payment plans (eg. perhaps pay things off over a few months or something
like that). In Canada, we can offer patients the option of post-dating a
cheque.
Nonetheless, there are some people out there that will not pay their bill.
Don't take it personally. They also probably don't pay other bills, too.
After a period of a few months of trying to get at least a partial payment
to no avail, its time to make a call to the friendly collection agency.
Accounts receivable can be kept down considerably by not taking payment
directly from the insurance company and instead the patient pays directly
for the services and they are later reimbursed by the carrier.
If a patient does not pay, it matters not. Bounced checks? Still does not
matter. Profits are earned in dentistry based upon contractual treatment
plans. These are implimented perhaps on three out of every ten patients
based upon,
a. Need for the service.
b. Ability to withstand the treatment.
c. Ability to pay for the service.
d. DESIRE for the service.
The seven out of ten will return for emergency care nad perhaps will refer
other patients that will go into to the same hopper.
In the case of the three, treatment is either financed, or the goods are
delivered after the payments are made, and the checks are cleared. I
personally offer 5% discount for payment in full in advance, or I refer to
thehillsidegroup.com to "write the paper" for the treatment.
Run the numbers. How could a dental office possibly gross $500,000, $1
million and upwards based upon one patient, $114 fee?
True. However getting volume is expensive. Many offices have overhead that
exceeds the $114 brought in by that one service! So they got to do something
else too.
