Question: What are some of the pros and cons of a medical office outsourcing its billing operation? Also, what kinds of questions should a practice ask a billing company that it may hire? But there can be drawbacks to having another entity handle all of your billing, HCCS says, including: Best strategy: To make sure you are aligning yourself with the best third-party billers in the business, HCCS recommends that you:
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Answer: Optometry offices that are contemplating third-party billers need to ask themselves some questions before giving up control of the process. While outsourcing may seem like a good idea in theory, each practice will need to evaluate for itself whether the arrangement will work in its favor.
The reasons a practice may outsource its billing vary, according to Managing Effective Patient Collections, a journal from Health Care Consulting Services Inc. (HCCS) in Cleveland.
But in general, medical practices choose to outsource billing because it:
- Saves the practice money
- Offers the practice access to professional financial expertise that it cannot afford to hire in-house
- Shifts billing issues to a third-party specialist
- Can improve office efficiency and can give the physicians more time to devote to patient care.
- You have a loss of control over billing practices
- You could have a messy breakup if things don't work out with a billing company and you need to get out of your contract
- Billing problems will take longer to identify and fix when a third party handles billing
- Third-party billers may end up costing a practice just as much as in-house billing.
- Ask billing companies for customer references.
- Look for companies that have experience billing in your specialty.
- Get monthly reports on billing. (Ask the billing company for a detailed adjustment report that lists write-offs so you can see if they-re justified.)
- Ask the billing company to identify who will handle your practice's account. Then contact that person and give him a billing quiz.
- Have benchmarks that the billing company is expected to meet written into the contract.
- Make sure the contract allows either party to terminate it with 30 to 90 days written notice.