7 Essential Elements for Patient Billing Statements That Pay Up

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• 7 Essential Elements for Patient Billing
  Statements That Pay Up
• RCM Brutal Facts If your eye care practice is
  like most physician practices, you collect only
  35 percent of fees due from patients at or before
  their office visits. And with high-deductible
  plans becoming more common, more and more of your
  practices revenue is coming out-of-pocket.
• Lets put aside for a moment all the things your
  practice can do to collect more revenue up front
  to focus on a single piece of paper thats
  probably bottlenecking your revenue cycle your
  eye care practices patient billing statement.
• Ive been working in or writing about the health
  care business for a total of 20 years. I have a
  PhD. And yet few things confuse me more than the
  health care bills I receive at my house. I must
  study the statements long and hard to decipher
  how much I owe. Many times the billing statements
  I receive are so ambiguous Im not even sure if
  any action at all is required from me.
• True Confession Sometimes Im so befuddled I
  just put the paper aside on my desk, hoping Ill
  receive another statement that spells things out
  more clearly. And that moment I put the paper
  aside adds unnecessary days to someones revenue
  cycle.
• All kinds of physician practiceslarge and
  smalltake care of my four boys, my husband, and
  me. Im gobsmacked that almost all of them make
  the simple mistake of making it as confusing as
  possible to pay what we owe. So take a look at
  the patient billing statements your practice or
  your billing company sends. Step outside of
  yourself for a minute. Could your mother
  understand it if she received it? What about your
  dimmest neighbour? Can you?
• Here are 7 things you can do to clarify your
  patient billing statements, recommended by HFMA
• State clearly that its a bill so that your
  patients dont confuse it with an EOB or any
  other of the non-actionable statements they
  routinely receive from health care entities. Use
  phrases like Bill for Eye Care Services for your
  5/14/2015 visit. Use arrow graphics with phrases
  like Please pay this amount.
• Briefly describe the services being billed. Avoid
  medical codes and medical jargon.

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• Clarify what insurance is expected to pay. The
  bill should list the patients primary and
  secondary insurance, as well the amount pending
  from insurance.
• Show clearly what the patient is expected to pay.
  Label the amount
• due from patient.
• Supplement the itemized, business part of the
  statement with clear directions in plain English.
  HFMA suggests, Thank you for using insert your
  Eye Care Group here. Your satisfaction is our
  primary concern. We have billed your insurance
  company however, there is a remaining amount, as
  shown. Please send the amount shown to the
  address above. Again, thank you for visiting us.
• Let your patients know how they can ask questions
  about their bill. In addition to the address
  where they should send payment, include a phone
  number. Supply the office hours when someone will
  be answering the phone.
• And most importantly for patients experiencing
  vision problems (and everyone else too), make
  your statement easy to read. Here are a few
  prints readability tips from some good graphic
  designers I know
• Use a plain white background.
• Use a clean layout.
• White space is easy on the eyes.
• Use as large a font as you can.
• Choose a sans serif font like Ariel.
• Avoid italics.
• Watch the leading (space between lines of text)
  and tracking (space between letters). If theyre
  too tight, your statement will be difficult to
  read.
• Use ragged right margins. If you choose justified
  right margins,